


This Hard Love

by Lambourn



Series: no one moves on in this town of ours [1]
Category: Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst, Getting Back Together, Homelessness, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, M/M, Pining, Pre-Canon, Secrets, Small Towns, canon hasn't ruled that out as being something alien-related, sorta soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-28
Updated: 2020-12-28
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:53:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 34,773
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28376517
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lambourn/pseuds/Lambourn
Summary: A series of interconnected stories for Michael Guerin week on tumblr 2020.What if Alex had stayed after high school? What if hadn't mattered? What if there were other forces at work that kept Michael and Alex apart?
Relationships: Background Isobel Evans/Noah Bracken, Michael Guerin/Alex Manes, background Max Evans/Jenna Cameron, brief Alex Manes/other, brief Michael Guerin/Kyle Valenti
Series: no one moves on in this town of ours [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2129682
Comments: 159
Kudos: 73





	1. This Hard Life

**Author's Note:**

> A huge thank you to Amanda for Michael Guerin week on tumblr. About the first 6 chapters were rather written in a fever dream each day with no forethought. The last chapter was a whole 'nother story.
> 
> Beta thanks go to the endlessly patient and always wonderful tasyfa ! 
> 
> Fic prompt: “You don’t have to stay”

“You don’t have to stay,” Max said quietly as he and Michael watched the newly married couple spin around the dance floor at the Roswell Community Center. Ann Evans had reluctantly compromised with Isobel over the wedding venue, after Isobel had firmly stated she was not going to have a destination wedding in Sedona. The consideration was made because she wanted both her brothers in attendance and comfortable with the surroundings; ultra rich and chic was not Michael’s speed at all. “Between Noah and I, I think Isobel will have plenty of support if you want to go.”

Michael didn’t spare Max a glance and brought his glass to his lips without comment. He dropped his gaze, from his sister’s happy squeal of laughter as Noah dipped her playfully, down to admire the single ice cube coated gold with bourbon. It was melting slowly from the artisan shape of the wedding-theme heart into formless water. 

That thought was probably too close to the truth of Michael’s life than a metaphor, especially with Alex gone.

Max used Michael’s silence to continue with gentle urging, “She hasn’t had an incident in years, not since that night. And she’s starting her married life now, she would understand if you wanted to leave Roswell. We both know you’re not happy here, not really, and you told me once that staying here was why you guys broke up- I could use my connections as the sheriff’s office to find him-”

“I know where he is,” Michael finally cut in quietly, swirling his drink gently. “And it wasn’t just Roswell that broke me and Alex up.”

It was probably a good 40 percent of the reason why Alex had left him two years ago. They had made it three hard years together after high school, making ends meet in a town that was actively hostile to the name ‘Alex Manes’ after Jesse had publicly disowned him for not enlisting in the Air Force. Only Mimi Deluca and Arturo Ortecho had been willing to employ Alex, while Michael had fallen into the backbreaking work of ranching in between fixing up cars on the side. Both of them learning the ins and outs of balancing their three minimum wage jobs between them to make rent each month. A balancing act that had tested their relationship. 

Love was stronger though, they had each other after all. It was fine to live inside a Bruce Springsteen song, almost romantic really, right up until the golden ticket of a label offer had been made to Alex. A passing tourist had heard him singing an original song at the Wild Pony’s open mic night. One upload on Youtube viewed by the right people had led to an unbelievable opportunity to write songs. No one in their right mind could have passed up that offer, but it had meant leaving Roswell for Nashville.

The real truth was, it hadn’t been just Michael’s insistence on staying in Roswell that had fueled the fights. The low pressure system of stress, like a never ending hurricane season, had just formed into more frequent blowouts. Small microaggressions over sharing a town still with Jesse Manes had morphed into big, no-holds barred tornadoes of wreckage but the butterfly winging its flight between them had been Michael’s secret.

There had been no words to use when Alex had pleaded, _“Come, just come with me. We didn’t have the money to leave this shithole after high school, but that’s changed now. We don’t have to stay here-”_

 _ **“You** don’t have to stay, but I can’t leave,_” had been all Michael could say in return, his lips locked tightly around his secret. The pods in the caves and the murder of the three girls had chained Michael in place, but Alex hadn’t had that baggage. The only things tying Alex to Roswell had been Michael and his friendship with the Delucas. A friendship that could have survived a long distance phone call, but a relationship, especially one fracturing over an unexplained rigid decision to stay, that could not have.

Isobel getting married didn’t release Michael from the weight dragging him down, but it did reignite that loneliness inside him. He had known all along that his life wasn’t meant for fairy-tale endings, and he tried to remind himself that at least he had had those three years with Alex. He couldn’t imagine standing here on the outskirts of Roswell’s most anticipated social event without having known that happiness, like his brother. Michael pressed his shoulder against Max’s, wondering if he was thinking about Liz. At least he knew where Alex was, whereas Liz Ortecho had become a ghost after high school, haunting the Crashdown in photos tacked up on the wall by her proud father Arturo but never darkening the doorstep in person. 

The heart’s edges in his glass had melted into a solid shape, barely recognizable to Michael’s eyes and entirely too close to the truth to pass as a metaphor in this hard life of his.


	2. This Hard Journey

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fic prompt: “There’s something you should know…”

_He finally got a dog,_ was all that Michael could think as he sat outside of the house that matched the address Max had pulled from the DMV. They had always wanted to get a dog together, but with pet deposits and the tight budget for rent and food, that had always been a non-starter for them. Not anymore.

The quiet shaded street just off the Buchanan Arts District was lined with old-style Craftsman homes, with sprawling McMansions, born of the house flipping obsession during the real estate boom, peppered in. New construction sprouting between old, mature trees, juxtaposing progress with tradition.

Alex had chosen one of the older homes, untouched by the remodeling fad with a large fenced in yard filling the property footprint, and a dog house that mimicked the main house in style. Two solid years of song-writing had rewarded Alex with financial security, and of course, after three years living in cramped efficiency apartments and noisy neighbors with Michael, the first thing Alex would have wanted again was a house. The roots of his upper middle class childhood were never far away.

Pressing his forehead against the steering wheel, Michael worked to gather the courage that had kept him propelled down the over 1,100 miles from Roswell to Nashville. He had made it here, the least he could do was knock on the door instead of freaking out over the fact that Alex had a house with a mortgage while all Michael could muster in the two years since was buying a bank-possessed Airstream.

At least it was better than sleeping rough in his truck again, something he had done when he had fallen behind on the rent after Alex had left.

Michael took a deep steadying breath and pushed himself out of his truck. The spans of sidewalk suddenly seemed longer than I-40 through Oklahoma. Another deep breath, the irony of borrowing Alex’s self-soothing habit not lost on Michael at all, he tucked his left hand into a pocket to hide the old damage and knocked firmly on the front door.

There was a long silence extended, shoving anticipation into chagrin as Michael turned his head to peek at the tiny side-carport, confirming there was a car there. A loud, chorus of deep barks picked up from within the house. The dog sounded big, but none of that registered as he picked up Alex’s voice, muffled and indistinct.

“-calm down, buddy. Stay- no, stay- It’s probably Daddy’s new speakers arriving-”

After two and half days of driving, Michael had perfected his speech to Alex. It hit every open wound between them, from the fact he was sorry he hadn’t gone with him, to the weak but true explanation that he hadn’t been ready then, but he was now. Then finally the big dice throw, the gamble of everything, that every city needed a good mechanic, Nashville was no different, it was no pressure- but maybe? Maybe they could start over?

The door swung open, and like a bag of spilled marbles, all of Michael’s words scattered away from him.

“Michael?” Alex’s polite smile for an expected delivery dropped into disbelieving shock. He did a comical double take, looking back into the house, then to Michael, then over Michael’s shoulder. The classic Chevy truck parked on the street chased away the shock. “Jesus Christ, it really is you.”

“Alex.” Michael swallowed, his eloquence gone. “You look good.”

They had had three years together, and during that time Michael had seen so many different versions of Alex Manes. He had seen Alex tired, dark circles shading his eyes more consistently than eyeliner with an off-kilter alien antennae from the Crashdown. He had seen Alex resolute, using his shoulders to impart a warning in his black clad Wild Pony shirt to any drunk who dared to give him a hard time. He had seen Alex awkward, helping Michael with his chores at the Foster’s ranch, cleaning out cow pens or pulling the twine efficiently off of baled hay. He had seen Alex ashamed, Michael patiently explaining during their first grocery store visit that the EBT card only covered certain items.

This Alex was new. Clean, well-rested, skin clear and not tight on his cheekbones from lean meals or bloated from cheap food. An earring shone from his ear, he was dressed in a soft v-neck shirt and artfully cut frayed jeans. Good was an understatement.

“What are you doing here?”

“I’m here- I’m here because Isobel got married, and um, she wanted to invite you, but I talked her out of it. I’m sorry. I mean for that, but also for like, everything. Not following you here was something I’ve regretted every day since, but I thought- I thought I had to stay back then, but I don’t anymore- and there’s something you should know-” 

“Babe? Is that our new speakers at the door?” A new voice called out, cutting off the word vomit that was spilling from Michael’s mouth beyond his control.

A male voice.

The wince and apology on Alex’s face told Michael everything he needed to know. Well. He probably should have seen that coming. Only Alex’s reaching out quickly to grab his hand as he turned away stopped him from bolting from the house.

“No, not our speakers, but an old friend from back home is here-” Alex called back, before turning back to make deliberate eye contact with Michael. “He wanted to stop by to say hello.”

A tall well-built black man came into view, holding a squirming pit bull in his arms, and walked toward them both with a bright welcoming smile, “A friend from Roswell? An actual flesh and blood human who knows you? I was starting to think you were an alien, Alex.”

“Just because you’re related to half of Nashville and went to school with the other half, Dennis, doesn’t mean I sprouted from a pod-” Alex shot back playfully, clearly picking up a well-worn argument. 

Like a couple. A real couple. With a house and a dog. Michael licked his dry lips, forcing his muscles upward, they probably had retirement accounts. In two years Alex had built something more secure than he had in the three years in Roswell.

“Well any friend of yours, Alex, is one of mine,” Dennis greeted, turning his head to avoid an excited dog kiss before transferring the bundle of fur into Alex’s arms in a fluid movement of trust. “I’m Dennis, welcome to Nashville, um-?” he prompted, extending his left hand to Michael.

“Michael Guerin,” he answered politely, before Michael lifted his left hand awkwardly from his pocket and offered his right in return. His name didn’t alter the warm smile on Dennis’s face. Ah. So he must be a nameless ex for Alex then. Swallowing hard, Michael continued, this time a little meanly, “This hand doesn’t shake so well after I got on the wrong side of a hammer, sorry. But good to meet you.”

The stutter of the clumsy interaction hid Alex’s wince and flash of pain of the reminder. 

Feeling no joy from that, Michael picked up the conversation lightly, “I’m a friend from high school. Been doing some transport work, and a job sent me here to pick up a car to drive back to Roswell, so I thought I might stop in and see what the famous Alex Manes is up to…”

“I’m not famous, I just write the words,” Alex protested quietly, before backing away from the doorway. “We were just about to have lunch, if you want to stay-”

“He’s famous, don’t listen to him,” Dennis interjected proudly. “Did you hear that new song from Paramore? Alex wrote that.”

“Oh I know, I have all the singles Alex wrote,” Michael smiled, looking around the house and at the couple with another deep breath. “I’m his biggest fan, I think. But um, thank you, I can’t stay, I gotta hit the road back to-” he started to say home, but that hadn’t been true for a long time. “Back to Roswell.”

*** 

Hours later with his heart heavy, Michael checked into his room at the Super 8. Normally the expense would have bothered him, but after his day, he figured he was entitled to a little bit of spoiling. And if it was sad that plain wrapped soaps and tiny shampoo bottles constituted spoiling, well, he was content with that.

The clunky black case of his small portable DVD player was propped open on the hotel bed. It was a hand-me-down as technology and electronic gadgets moved into smoother, more versatile means. For him, it was perfect to watch a borrowed DVD in his Airstream since he lacked cable.

With the entire contents of a motel conditioner in his hair, Michael started the paused video file. The shaky dark footage started playing, the sound crackling with amateur hands, before the clear, strong voice of Alex Manes filled the air. 

It was probably pathetic to watch this cribbed footage from YouTube, but the romanticism that had fueled his journey down 1-40 was also the same sentiment that had preserved this moment in amber for Michael. Pulling open his old notebook from high school, he let Alex’s voice singing about love and loss carry him through the calculations of point atmospheric entry and the parallax distance of habitable stars.

It would be a hard journey, but Michael didn’t know any other kind at this point. He didn’t begrudge Max for urging this trip, because now Michael knew for sure. The possibilities of being with Alex again could be gently laid to rest in his mind, with that tombstone of hope to mark them. 

Roswell wasn’t his home. Nashville wasn’t going to be home either, but the universe was ever-expanding, surely there was a place for Michael?


	3. This Hard Choice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> set before THIS HARD LIFE and THIS HARD JOURNEY - an AU after the shed. This chapter is set sometime after the moment in 2x05.
> 
> Fic prompt: “I don’t want you to go.”

The careful crunch of loose gravel and abrasive echo of a skateboard stopping on the rough pavement let Michael know that his attempt to avoid Alex had failed. 

Parking down by Spring River, not far from where the concrete shelter of the Atkinson Ave overpass sported some of the late Rosa Ortecho’s graffiti murals, would have been an excellent place to hide from everyone in his life but Alex. It was insane to think that in such a short time, Michael had basically shared all of his favorite spots with him, from the private desert escape on a cut back gravel road not far from the crash site to the places in town when Michael couldn’t spare the fuel to drive far, like Loveless Park or the back acres of wrecked and salvaged cars at Sander’s Auto.

He would care more about his failure in evading Alex if he wasn’t so currently high. 

Old man Sanders had let him crash on the couch last night with Rusty, his dog, and then left him the next morning with scrambled eggs and a small paying job of cleaning out the machinery tools used for alignment repairs. _“Gotta use that MEK shit on it, it smells awful, so it’s a perfect job for you, kid, only need the one hand to clean the threads,”_ Sanders had instructed nodding to his bandaged hand as he handed over a pair of twenty dollar bills with a metal canister of solvent.

The money put gas in the truck and the leftover solvent was carefully hoarded for an experiment. Even with Michael’s careful handling of his make-shift cast while he worked on the task, he still finished having jarred the break one too many times.

Blue, cloudless sky stretched above him, keeping him warm and comfortable with a rare full stomach of breakfast. It was the perfect time, with his hand pulsing in unceasing agony, to test his theories about the effects other solvents had on his body outside of pain killing effects of acetone. There wasn’t much to lose, he reasoned darkly as he drank two quick swallows of MEK and laid back on his sleeping bag waiting for the effects to kick in, for better or worse.

Acetone reduced pain to a soft buzz in the background, like a gnat circling on the edges of his periphery. This solvent made him feel like the gnat, flying wildly through the negative space. 

Negative space, he mused with his eyes closed. That fit with close-tailored accuracy to his future prospects.

“Guerin, hey, Guerin!”

Right. Alex was here. Alex had found him. He was trying to avoid Alex for some reason. He couldn’t remember why at the moment as he opened his eyes to Alex’s handsome worried face. Christ, he was beautiful. Those eyebrows were bridged together though, closing the distance. Michael wanted to be that in the moment. A bridge, not a chasm. Not the negative space.

A warm, soft hand caressed Michael’s face, bringing his fluttering attention back to Alex’s. Sometime in between his thoughts, Alex had clambered up into the truck bed to sit next to him. The hint of amusement in his dark eyes won out over concern, “Are you just really high right now?”

“Yeah, super high,” Michael breathed, smiling broadly before moving to make room for Alex next to him.

Alex pursed his lips together, taking in a deep inhale of the surrounding air, “I don’t smell pot-”

“Not pot, something better.”

The concern and alarm was back as Alex started to pull away from Michael’s clumsy hold and look around the truck bed. “Like what, like, meth or OXY?”

“‘S fine, don’t worry, ‘kay?” Michael wrinkled his nose at the movements, and patted the space on his chest with his right hand. “Come lay back down, okay?”

“No, not okay, you need to tell me what you took so if you start to O.D. I can tell the hospital how to treat you-” 

The talk of a hospital cut through the fog. Michael pushed himself up with his good hand, before reaching to still Alex’s searching through the discarded blankets around him. Thankfully the discarded canister of MEK was in the cab of the truck with the contents of his pharmacy robbery, the box of nail polish remover and clean bandages. “No hospitals ever, okay? I’m fine, I promise. It was just… um, OXY like you said.” 

Staring in Michael’s eyes, Alex paused, still concerned and wary. “How much did you take?”

“Like two pills, and um, it wasn’t even off label, okay?” Michael raised his left hand, the dirty ragged cast punctuating the need. Like it had every time before, the reminder of that night in the shed sent a wave of shame and regret over Alex’s face. An effective subject killer, but it still pained Michael to use it. “Before you ask, I got the pills from Isobel. Her mom had dental surgery so they were left over. I didn’t rob the pharmacy for drugs.”

“I know.”

“You know?” While the rock-solid belief was nice, that wasn’t a part of his experience. 

Dropping his gaze down to Michael’s sloppy cast, Alex shrugged. “I overheard Jim Valenti telling my dad about the robbery, no drugs or money were stolen. Just beauty supplies and first aid stuff. It’s getting dismissed as kid type vandalism, not evidence of a drug cartel in Roswell.”

“That’s good.” Finally, news that brought relief to Michael, instead of increasing the heavy weight of dread in his chest. He started to lay back down on his sleeping bag and this time Alex followed, removing his keys and wallet from his jean pockets. Resting his face against Michael’s chest, his warm breath cutting easily through the thin cotton t-shirt, the argument was now forgotten between them as they took comfort in the closeness.

The high from the MEK was slowly fading, tiptoeing from his veins like a thief in the night. The echoing ache of his hand started up, the footfalls of sensation, getting closer and louder as the afternoon wore on until it was time for another bottle of acetone to chase it away. At least he knew the other solvent wouldn’t kill him, whatever that was worth.

“I looked it up, Roswell has a free clinic on Main if it’s about money-”

Not this fight again. It was his least favorite one, after the scholarship to UNM. Michael kept his voice soft, even though a surge of impatience tightened his throat. “Alex, I can’t, okay? I can’t go to the free clinic because people are going to ask questions.”

“My dad deserves to get punished for what he did-” Alex lifted his eyes up to Michael’s from where he was tucked against Michael’s side.

“Not just about what happened. First question they ask is about ID, okay? And the address on my ID is two foster dicks ago. I can’t risk it. Attention from the authorities has never brought me anythin’ good.” Michael reached to stroke his fingertip over the renewed worried line on Alex’s face, “I know you think it should just be easy, like seeing a doctor, or going to UNM even though my scholarship only covers tuition and housing, not food, or gas, or school supplies outside of books.”

Alex frowned in response, “I’m not naive, Michael, I know all of that.”

“Yeah? Do you know how expensive it is to be homeless?” Pride nearly stopped that admission to Alex, but he was tired of fighting with the one person that seemed to care about him. “It’s ironic, but it’s true. No address, no bank account, but at least I’m finally eighteen with a high school diploma, so I can have a fighting chance at taking a cheap retail job to serve the tourists. ‘Cause right now my budget covers gas for my truck, food, and paying to use the truck stop showers out by Cowboy Ruckus twice a week, so I’m not shown the door as soon as I show up somewhere.” Michael had to shut his eyes to keep from seeing pity on Alex’s face. It wasn’t his fault that he didn’t understand the ins and outs of how well the system protected everyone who worked within it, but no one that stood on the outside of it.

It reminded him why he was avoiding Alex today in the first place. 

Last night Alex had seen him at the Wild Pony. At Ranchero Night. While Alex had been there to help Maria and her mother, the assistant manager of the bar and restaurant, in hosting the outreach night, Michael had had no other reason for showing up except for the obvious one. He had been hungry and the grudgingly offered program by Old Fred that Mimi Deluca spearheaded had meant he was going to get a full belly of ample hot food with no questions asked.

The stories behind his favorite parking spots in downtown Roswell weren’t romantic discoveries to share with Alex, they all revolved around proximity to safety and soup kitchens. Even showing up too many times at a particular food bank carried risk, from the other men who lived rough. The fights that happened between prime sleeping spots, between two people comparing their nothing with less than nothing, spun up quickly. It was ugly, dangerous and Michael’s telekinesis could only keep him safe up to a point.

“And sometimes I go places where there’s free food and no questions. Like Ranchero night.” There was no disguising how hard his heart was pounding under Alex’s ear, but Michael could concentrate on keeping his breathing steady as he waited fearfully for his response. Finally, unable to stay quiet, Michael ventured, “Still want to be with me?”

Alex lifted his head, biting his lip briefly. Slowly, with a mindful eye on Michael’s cast, he shifted closer to kiss Michael’s mouth gently. “I didn’t realize how hard things were, um, I’m glad you told me. I wish it didn’t take me seeing you at the Wild Pony for you to tell me.”

“You’ve got your own shit with your dad at home. At least I know my truck is safe, you don’t have that luxury.” It was something that Michael couldn’t help but worry about every night since the shed when he wasn’t worrying about Isobel. The level of violence and the comfort that Jesse Manes had in using that against his own son, while it shouldn’t have shocked a veteran of Child and Family Services, it did. Every night Alex went home to that. 

“It hasn’t been bad since that night, but I’m dodging my dad as much as I can. He’s probably just waiting until I’m 18.”

“Waiting for what?”

It was Alex’s turn to evade as he laid soft, suckling kisses down Michael’s throat. Michael chased at Alex’s lips, threading his fingers through the fading evidence of the black hair dye warring with the summer bleaching. They traded long, deep kisses, the heat of arousal building layers over the question until it slipped from view unanswered.

*** 

Michael walked confidently down the halls of the Roswell Travelodge toward the back stairs. The key to trespassing was to act as naturally as possible and hope he didn’t run into someone who knew him. Using the free ice machine in the various motels around town to stock up his small cooler was just one of the many life hacks he picked up since striking out on his own at sixteen.

His face was still throbbing from the lucky hit that jackass got in earlier after Michael had picked up dinner at the Ministries of Light community event. Someone had felt like Michael needed to pay the unofficial cover to partake in the meal, and Michael had flipped off the guy, because every year on this planet had taught him how to treat a bully. A bully always had friends, and walking back late at night with a full stomach had meant he hadn’t noticed his crowd of ‘admirers’ until they’d had him surrounded, just a block from his truck. 

Thankfully between rolling a dumpster with his telekinesis and his fast retreat, he had made it to safety with only the slowly swelling eye as a souvenir.

It had been at least three days since he had last crashed at Sanders, long enough to impose again on the old man’s couch. Michael finished filling his cooler with ice, wrapping a cold chunk in a discarded t-shirt to press against his face, and drove toward the auto yard with a plan in mind. Maybe the old man needed Michael to fix something. His left hand had improved enough now to move from awkward plaster to a drug-store brace, leaving some of his fingers free for more dexterous work. 

His headlights picked up a vague flash of movement just outside the office of the auto yard. Mindful of Rusty the dog, Michael slowed his approach to a crawl until he realized the movement wasn’t the yard dog, but Alex.

Michael swung out of the truck quickly, dropping the wrapped ice on the seat. Alex being here, unannounced, could only be trouble related to Jesse. “Hey, what’s going on?”

Straightening up from his seat in front of the office, whatever Alex was going to say originally abruptly vanished as he caught sight of Michael’s face under the wavering beam of the security lights. “What the hell happened to your eye?” 

Belated he reached up to touch his face, and joked, “A fight, but you should see the other guy. Or guys. I think it was at least four on one. But I’m okay.”

The bruise must have been more impressive than Michael realized because Alex just paled in response. Agitated Alex crossed his arms in front, turning half away as he rubbed his hands bare of jewelry against his forearms. “What the hell am I doing?” he asked himself quietly. 

“Alex?” Michael stepped closer, fear dropping his stomach downward in nausea. It was a dark survivor’s thought, but it would be a shameful waste to get sick now after a good meal. “Are you okay? Is it your dad?”

“I’m turning 18 tomorrow,” Alex replied in a non sequitur quietly. 

It didn’t sound like a joyous thing to reach the age of legal adulthood for Alex. “Happy birthday?” 

“My dad- listen, it’s never really been a choice okay? I’ve known it for as long as I can remember. I mean, fuck, I have to sign on my own, he can’t do it for me, but he might as well hold the pen in my hand.”

Michael wasn’t stupid. He knew enough about Alex’s family, his brothers, that the expectation of military service was less of a question and more of an accepted fact. He also knew Alex, who Alex was, and that was not a soldier of any kind. All of his reasoned arguments against this action jumbled in Michael’s throat, until the only thing that burst forward was inane words, “But you’re gay though, you can’t enlist!”

Huffing a tired sigh, Alex smiled sadly, “There are gay people every branch of the services, Michael. They just have to hide. My dad… my dad expects this of me. To join, to hide, to be...to be a Manes Man finally.”

“You can’t, you just can’t-” he squeezed his eyes shut tightly, breathing through his nose as he fought the nausea again. “I don’t want you to go.”

“I don’t want to go either.” Alex reached for Michael’s face, keeping his touch light over the hot swelling bruise. The mark on Michael’s face seemed to deepen the grief in Alex’s eyes. “It’s never been a choice for me.”

“It can be. It can be a choice, if you just tell him no.”

“He would kill me.”

“The Air Force is just as capable of killing you too.” Michael reached up to guide Alex’s hand down to press against his chest, letting the wild beat of his pulse thrum against Alex’s palm. This boy, this kind and beautiful boy, brought the spark of life to all of the lost and deliberately discarded opportunities in Michael’s life. The thought of Alex being shuffled off to that same, colorless existence that he was stuck in after lighting Rosa Ortecho’s car on fire, threatened to break something in him. “Cutting yourself off from who you are, it changes you, and it’s not a good change. Please don’t do this to yourself.” 

Instead of responding, Alex looked back at the dark office of Sanders Auto behind them. “I don’t have to be home tonight, Sarge is letting me have one last night of freedom, so is it okay if I stay with you?”

“It’s an ancient couch I share with the dog,” Michael warned, licking his dry lips in response. At Alex’s nod, he led Alex over by the hand to the customer keys dropbox and mailbox. After a moment he fished the key out from the hideaway safe and unlocked the office door. 

One last night together as innocent kids before the hard choices had to be made.

***

The next day, Michael ignored his schedule, the scratched out decisions that kept him functioning and moving with one foot in front of the other. Instead of partaking in the truck stop shower or heading for laundry day at the Evanses’, as Ann and Bob always did a late brunch at their club, he instead decided to join Max for his thrice weekly coffee stalking of Arturo Ortecho. 

The scent of Alex was still all over him after he had slept soundly on top of Michael, the only way to share that narrow couch. Rusty the dog had had to settle with wedging his way between their legs and the less said of the amused look on old man Sanders face when he had discovered them that morning, the better. 

_Alex’s probably finished signing his life away at this point_ , Michael reminded himself.

“Jeez, he looks like such a tool,” Max commented, breaking into the cycle of Alex-related thoughts abruptly. Michael turned to look out the window of the Crashdown to see Kyle Valenti beaming and gesticulating excitedly in front of a new red Camaro. Both his parents, in uniform already for work, were watching their son proudly, arm in arm. “I don’t know how the Valentis raised a jerk like Kyle.”

Nice parents, nice car, nice life ahead of him for school as rumor had it that Kyle was headed to Michigan, and it was clear from Michael’s eyes the guy had no appreciation of the privileged ease of his life. All of that love and support in his life, only for Kyle Valenti to use it to bully people. Bully Alex. 

Anger was never far behind these days for Michael, his ever-present cellmate as he served his time for Isobel’s crimes. It swelled inside him, as the sun sparkled off the hubcaps and dazzled the eyes of onlookers from that deep cherry red car. Red like Rosa’s lipstick. Red like Liz’s prom dress. Red like the blood after the hammer dropped.

“Yeah, Jim Valenti deserves better.” That was Alex’s voice. 

Michael jerked his head away from the window to find Alex standing next to their booth. He had to be dreaming. Alex was supposed to be at a recruiter’s office, losing his freedom and all evidence of his personality right now, probably getting the remnants of that emo black dye job buzzed off at the barber. 

Except he wasn’t. Alex’s hair was still long and shaggy, brown sun-lightened locks spilling over his warm dark eyes. His earring and septum plug were back in, along with his jewelry. A lot of jewelry actually. Like maybe all of the jewelry Alex owned. Resting at his feet was a heavy duffle bag, the seams straining under the force of clothing packed inside. 

“Alex.” 

Shyly, Alex looked over at Max back to him, “Michael. It’s good to see you guys hanging out together again.”

“Alex.” Stupidly Michael kept staring at Alex, as if he was going to disappear if he blinked. “You’re here. You’re- you’re actually here, you didn’t-?”

Max creased his forehead, watching Michael completely unravel before him. “I kinda feel like I’m missing something here?”

“Alex Manes,” Alex held out his hand to Max jokingly, a small smile on his lips. He took a deep, audible breath and continued more seriously, “the disowned son of Master Sergeant Manes, currently homeless, and um, also Michael’s boyfriend.”

“Disowned?” 

“I had a choice, joining the Air Force or getting kicked out of the family. And um, so I’m going to be crashing on Maria’s couch for a while, just until I can save up-” Alex’s explanation was abruptly silenced as Michael launched himself from the booth toward him. His bag hit the ground as Alex wrapped both arms around Michael tightly. 

The patrons of the café faded into the background as Michael pressed his suddenly wet eyes into Alex’s neck. “Oh, thank god, you didn’t go.”

“I never wanted to go, okay?” Slowly Alex drew away a few inches, keeping his gaze on Michael’s face. His eyes narrowed at the bruise still blackening Michael’s eye, “And the choice wasn’t hard, when I realized it was you I was choosing. You gotta pick me too, okay? No more fights or robbing drug stores, I can deal with a lot, I know this won’t be easy being together but I can’t deal with violence. You gotta try, Michael.”

“Yes, yes, deal.” Aware of Max’s growing distrustful gaze, Michael ignored it. That could be their next fight with his brother after the subject of Isobel had been worn out, whether being close to someone human constituted a threat to their safety. Right now, the hard choice between their secret and Alex, didn’t have to be made yet. 


	4. This Hard Town

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fic prompt: The Lost Decade/ “We are a family.”

“You can’t tell him.”

Michael was beginning to regret asking Max to come to Sanders’ to be his lookout. It was unfortunately necessary though, he needed to use his powers to repair the old Honda Civic he had bought off of the old man. It had been a half-cash and half trade for future work at the garage, because even with a broken axle and ruined transmission, the body of the car was out of his carefully saved budget of $500. He had to ignore the itch of suspicion that old man Sanders was giving him more of a deal than could be explained away in any other term but charity.

It was for Alex, he reminded himself, Alex needed a car, so he could do this.

Before Alex, the language of deals and favors that Michael spoke had been strictly weighed and examined for any sign of pity. The chip that Michael had picked up after his first foster placement with the lovely-on-paper but deep-into-the-meth-business family had settled on his shoulder and only grown in size over the years. So many kind, but blind adults that had shuffled him from one home to another, always with apologies when Michael inevitably found himself discarded, had given him immunity to acts propelled by good faith.

Then Alex, living in his own domestic war zone, had offered Michael shelter, for no other reason than to be kind. The offer had been made without an expiration date and without a price. What had started as just another place to insert into Michael’s rotating wheel of safe shelters, a needed break from imposing too much on Mr. Sanders, had quickly become his favorite place. Mostly because of Alex.

The impulse to push away a too generous offer was still there, but now when Michael’s pride tossed roadblocks in front of him, he had a more motivating reason to accept; Alex. It wasn’t just Michael who suffered out of misplaced vanity, they were a team now. Considering the sacrifices and personal consequences that Alex faced for choosing to stay with Michael, swallowing down a protest and accepting help was the very least Michael could do.

Alex’s defection from the path of military service had earned him a powerful enemy in Jesse Manes, paternal ties be damned. Public opinion was still heavily swayed by the word of the highest ranked NCO in Roswell, the Air Force being the largest employer. 

The campaign of harassment against Alex had started subtly enough after he’d orientated himself from his week-long freak out on Mimi Deluca’s futon after being disowned. His employment at the UFO Museum, where he had given his notice out of a dreaded-forgone conclusion about enlistment, had mysteriously not reinstated despite the sign out front advertising for ‘Help Wanted’. Confused, but chalking up that experience as Mr. Greene wanting to hire someone else all along, Alex had prepared a meager resume of his high school diploma, his experience with a cash register and two personal letters of recommendation from Mimi and Mr. Ortecho, and then hit the streets of Roswell looking for work.

Entry level positions at the small souvenir shops lining Main Street were all looking for “someone with more experience.” 

With retail stores presumably looking for a candidate that required no training, Alex had instead turned to the two small unions that were recruiting apprentice-level electricians and carpenters for work. No experience necessary, the ads promised. For the interviews, Alex had removed his makeup and jewelry, dressed himself in plain slacks and the pale blue button down shirt scavenged from his prom suit. He had been prepared to parrot whatever ‘learn fast work hard’ line required and for a week he had waited for a call back, only to find out that both unions were looking for something different.

When the sole music store in Roswell, clinging to the market with offerings of vinyl and free entry level guitar lessons, had turned Alex down out of concern he was ‘too qualified’, it stopped being a coincidence. This was a coordinated campaign to keep Alex unemployed that traced back to Jesse Manes.

Michael could still remember knocking on the door of Mimi Deluca’s house, his body sore and tired from his first day at Fosters Ranch, convinced that Alex would be gone this time for sure. When the deck was so obviously stacked against him, no one would have blamed Alex for caving. He couldn’t sleep on the Deluca futon forever. If there were no jobs in Roswell unless Alex conceded to Jesse’s demand, then it made sense. 

The door to the small Deluca house had swung open then, with Jim Valenti dressed in his sheriff brown uniform stepping out to say to Alex, “Just come by the station, we can always use a person on the phones, Alex, if you’re not interested in the police academy.” The sheriff, looking older than Michael had remembered him being, had given him a quick up and down look before remarking, “Glad you’ve been staying out of trouble, Mr. Guerin.”

Alex had followed Jim out to the front yard, looking small but hopeful, “He’s going to find me some office work at the sheriff’s office, and um, Arturo is down two waitresses with um, the circumstances.” Rosa’s death and Liz’s departure. 

With the tacit approval of the Sheriff, Alex had also been able to pick up work at the Wild Pony as a bouncer for the evenings. Between the three small jobs, and with Michael’s work at the Foster Ranch, things had been looking up for them. After a month of pooling their money together, Alex had been able to move off of Mimi’s couch to find a tiny one room efficiency apartment with Michael.

Their first home together and Michael’s first home period. The neighborhood was on the edges of the industrial park, more broken sidewalks and half-lite street lights than anything else, but it was theirs. No A/C, only a central building furnace that had two settings, on or off, and paper thin walls, it was hardly a winner with Architectural Digest. It had a sturdy door with three locks and room for a queen size mattress that Michael had picked up from the street after Isobel threw an impressive fit demanding all new bedroom furnishings to properly conform to her mood for studying event planning at the community college.

Charity but not. Michael could do these things now for Alex.

The apartment and job had ended up being the easiest part of their struggle when the next step of Jesse’s harassment campaign picked up. Enough citizens had directed sneers and not ‘under breath’ comments whenever Michael and Alex were out together, that Michael had sincerely wondered if the Westboro Baptist Church had relocated from Kansas to New Mexico overnight. In the Sheriff’s Office, Alex was safe from the in person harassment and only dealt with an increased frequency of prank phone calls, until Jim Valenti had started paying house visits to the sources via caller ID. At the Wild Pony though, even with Mimi Deluca watching with an eagle eye, Alex often came home to wash spit out of his hair or worse from suspiciously focused raucous drunks. 

The worst was at the Crashdown, where the Long family’s grief intersected with Jesse Mane’s homophobia. Absolutely disgusting tables were left frequently when Alex was covering tables to clear, and the graffiti and defaced windows now added homophobic slurs to the racist nonsense. 

Through it all, Alex had kept going, only breaking down late at night to cry into Michael’s arms. All of Michael’s anger directed to the losses he had personally faced had drained away at the first tear on his skin from Alex. This beautiful boy had given up a choice, that would have been socially easier to make even if spiritually harder, all for Michael. The least that Michael could do was try to be worth it. 

Then the jars had appeared in their apartment, and it had set a new challenge for Michael. The first two labeled with “college” and “music” were fine, but the last one, the last dream marked with ‘moving’ was harder to reconcile. He tried not to feel guilty in feeding his spare change first toward the music fund, then after Alex was able to buy a guitar and amp, the college fund, ignoring the slow growing ‘moving’ jar with all of his might.

Speaking of ignoring, Max nudged Michael’s leg from where it was exposed under the Honda. “You know you can’t, right?”

“Max, shut up, okay,” Michael replied as he worked to straighten the bent metal with his mind. “I’m aware of your feelings on this subject.”

“It’s not that I don’t like Alex,” Max continued, disregarding Michael’s comment. “It’s only been six months, and if you tell him and then break up-”

“Seriously, you can shut the fuck up.”

“He’ll still know and I don’t know if I want Isobel using her powers to take that away. She would have to make him forget he knew our secret and probably send him away, which I don’t even know if she has the power to do that. It’s better she doesn’t do anything until we know what’s at the root of her blackouts.”

Michael swallowed his frustration with Max, as guilt took its place smoothly. He was well aware of how easily Isobel could get into someone’s head and send them away. Liz Ortecho had missed the funeral, as small as it was for her own sister after Isobel’s suggestion. Nausea briefly bloomed inside him as he thought about Alex getting the same treatment. If it ever became necessary, Michael decided he would have Isobel get inside his head too, and make him forget Alex in turn.

After six months together, Michael couldn’t contemplate a future without Alex. 

“How is Isobel?” Michael asked instead, focusing the heat of his torch on strengthening the frame of the car to smooth over the weak spot caused by a high velocity torque force of a crash. Like a broken bone, the welded point would hold more strength than it had before the wreck had happened. His own hand, with its stubborn frozen ring and pinky finger could attest to that after the imperfect healing after the shed.

“She’s tired of me following her to class, but I think that’s because I correct the grammar of our teacher.” Both Max and Isobel had enrolled in a two-year associates program at the local community college. Isobel was moving toward business administration, while Max waffled between a basic degree and one in criminal justice. “She’s worried about Alex too. Um, not about you telling him, but that you might-”

“Freak out and murder him?” Michael finished softly. He was aware that while Max worried about the secret getting revealed when Michael had moved in with Alex, Isobel on the other hand worried about Alex’s safety. After all, she still believed that after a drunken fight, Michael had lost control and murdered Rosa, Katie and Jasmine in a rampage. She still worried that Michael could do it again. “Did you tell her I haven’t been in a fight in six months?”

“I’m sorry, Michael, I know-” Max’s voice was pained. Michael could picture his crease of martyred misery perfectly. 

“I get it. Listen, I gotta get finished up here so I can go get Alex from the station and drive him to the Wild Pony for his shift,” Michael pushed himself out from under the car to grab an old t-shirt to wipe the grease on. “There was an incident on the bus yesterday, so I kinda don’t want him taking it anymore.”

“Incident?” 

“Some young Airmen hassled him, the standard homophobic bullshit thanks to his dad still being chief bigot in Roswell. He says they didn’t touch him, it was just words but I could tell it shook him up, so I want to get this car roadworthy so he won’t have to take the bus anymore.” Michael glanced at his watch, and then mustered up a smile for Max, “Um thanks for looking out. I know the old man is half-blind, but better safe than sorry when I’m floating a car with my brain.”

The previous hangdog expression of guilt was gone as Max brightened at the olive branch. Whatever concerns he had over Alex Manes, Max should be thankful that Alex had stayed in Roswell, just because of the change it had inspired in Michael. The brotherly blow outs had turned from playful during high school to vicious, starting right after Rosa’s funeral. After Michael had moved into his small apartment with Alex, the weight Michael had carried from Rosa’s death hadn’t seemed so heavy to carry and the friction he had felt seeing Max and Isobel enjoy an easier life had vanished. Waking up to Alex’s wild dark hair and coffee-deprived grumpiness soothed the wildness.

Michael felt lucky finally in his life. 

“You’re welcome, Michael. We’re family.”

“I know,” Michael paused fingering his keys to the truck, “we are.” He stopped short of explaining to Max that Alex was his family too. Maybe in time, after all it’s only been six months, Max would come to that conclusion on his own.

***

“You can’t tell him.”

“Well, he doesn’t understand why and I can’t explain it without telling him.”

Max opened up his polished wooden sideboard and pulled out an unopened bottle of Gran Patron Piedra. He carried the bottle over to where Michael was sitting slumped in misery on the couch of Max’s newly purchased house. The half-graduation present and half-birthday present to celebrate Max’s degree and job offer from Jim Valenti. Michael couldn’t even find it inside him to be envious that the Evanses had once again showered his siblings with gifts.

He was too busy wrestling with the knowledge that he was going to lose Alex. 

Three nights ago, Alex had finished up his last set at the Wild Pony’s Open Mic Night, one of the first changes Maria had instituted after buying the Wild Pony from Old Fred, to find a pair of fans that weren’t just fans. Going off the business cards, they were in the business of venture capitalism in music production, backing songwriters and selling publishing rights to various record labels to produce. A grainy YouTube upload of Alex performing one of his original songs had sparked not only interest but downright enthusiasm of an undiscovered artist. The deal was good, healthy but fair compensation with enough clauses that Alex wouldn’t be trapped in a future inequality if he found success on his own. It just depended on Alex working from Nashville with their team. 

The jar labeled ‘moving' had been emptied several times over the last three years to Michael’s relief. Alex had stubbornly refused to let Michael draw from the college jar when unforeseen expenses had happened, like that winter that Alex had caught the flu so badly that it had turned into pneumonia requiring a night’s stay in the hospital, or the time Michael’s truck had been impounded over old unpaid parking tickets from his stint of living on the streets.

Emptying the ‘moving’ jar was like buying Michael time with Alex, it came with a rush of relief followed by guilt. But now, that jar was superfluous in the face of this job offer.

Trying to help, Max poured a healthy splash of tequila into a glass for Michael and offered weakly, “Maybe he won’t take the offer?”

“What? Are you kidding me? He’s taking the fucking offer,” Michael fired back with a fierce glare. “This is his dream. Do you know the chances of an offer like this happening once in a lifetime? It won’t happen again. It’s like surviving a spaceship crash.” He wrapped his hands around the glass, staring down at the tequila. “He hates this town, hell, it’s pretty mutual with how his dad has everyone blackmailed into doing his bidding. He’s only stayed this long because of me.”

“And you’ve only stayed here because of me,” Max finished. “Me and Isobel. Listen, Michael, you can-”

“It’s not just you, I mean, we crashed here. This place is the only connection I have to our families, to my family from before.” Rubbing his fist against his face as he downed the shot quickly. “I can’t exactly explain that to Alex. He wants me to go with him, he thinks it should be easy for me, because what do I have? I have our shitty apartment, my truck and the job at Sanders. He doesn’t understand that you and Isobel are more than friends to me.”

“Maybe you could tell him about the group home? It doesn’t explain everything but-”

“He loves Maria and Mimi Deluca, but he’s still ready to send them a postcard from Nashville. Even if I explain our connection, it doesn’t change anything. There’s still Isobel to consider. I mean she’s been fine since that night with Rosa-” Michael stopped as he watched Max wince and shift in discomfort. “Wait, has she not been fine, Max?”

“I was going to mention this earlier, before you came busting in about Alex, but Isobel has been off lately. More...disconnected. It’s like it was in high school. Mom has even noticed it, but she thinks Iz love-struck by the guy Dad just hired at the office, Noah-something.” 

“Fuck. Blackouts again?”

Max shrugged, and poured another two shots for them. “Could be, but I don’t know.” He held out the glass to Michael, visibly wrestling with a thought. “Listen Michael, you’ve done so much for Isobel and for me, and I know how much you love Alex, so if you decide to follow him, I would understand.” 

It was a kind benediction for Max to offer him. 

Inside of Michael were two impossible and now opposite forces pulling on his soul, being wherever Alex was and the connection he felt to their pods, to Max and Isobel in particular. The math kept telling him that it had to be three for them to survive on earth safe, and maybe that was old conditioned thinking from when he was a mute seven-year-old. Or maybe it was species related.

Michael sighed, and reached for his black hat to settle over his curls. “Feels like no matter what I do, I’m going to be saying goodbye to my family. Anyway, you should go check on Isobel, I gotta head back home to help Alex pack for Nashville.”

***

“You gonna tell me what happened in Nashville yet?” Max asked gently, after filling Michael in on the latest news in Roswell that happened while he was away on his short, romantic but foolish trip to Tennessee. 

“I didn’t tell him. I didn’t tell him why I let him go.”

“That seems clear, but still, what happened?”

Michael slipped deeper in his camp chair, watching the firelight lick at the edges of the pit. “He’s got a good life, found a good man it seems like, and he’s happy. Basically everything I ever wanted for him. His blood family is shit, but looks like he’s made himself a new one there. Even got a dog.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I dunno, I guess try and do the same?”

That still felt like an impossible task to Michael. Finishing his ship in his bunker and achieving space flight had a greater chance for success.

Max was quiet for a moment, taking a long pull off the bottle of beer. At twenty-three with two years of law enforcement training under his belt, he was slower with choosing his words with Michael. The legacy of serving all of the public, even the rough talking citizens and realizing it was his neighbors he policed. Protect and serve, with the emphasis on the serve, was Jim Valenti’s motto. “You remember Liz Ortecho?”

That stopped Michael in his tracks. Liz Ortecho was a very rarely discussed subject between them, especially after Alex had left him. 

“We were never together- I mean, there was a moment where we could have had something, you know? But then Rosa, and well she left. It’s been five years, you know, and I still remember dancing with her just the once. I’ve tried to move on, Michael, I have. I mean we weren’t even together!” Max repeated, before laughing weakly. “It’s been two years for you, and I know you’ve tried too. I guess what I’m saying is, we might be doomed.”

“I guess we are family then,” Michael leaned across the makeshift patio in front of his Airstream to clink his beer bottle against Max’s. The comradery warmed the spot inside of Michael that had frozen solid after Alex’s boyfriend had appeared, grateful to have at least this with Max as unlikely as it was to have imagined back in 2008. They were stuck with each other in this hard town. “At least Isobel’s happy.”

“Yeah, at least Isobel is happy with Noah.”

****


	5. This Hard Lie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fic prompt: “Just trust me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the section with Kyle/Michael content, along with adult content.

There was something intensely meditative about sucking cock for Michael. 

Opening his mouth wide past comfort into an ache of effort, the firm press on his palate mixing with the surge of salt-bitter on his tongue, the mess of saliva and pre-cum smearing sloppily over his face as he dropped into a state where listening to his partner’s enjoyment was the only thing that registered. The world slipped away as he took measured breaths, his mind finally quiet, until all that was left was Michael being good. 

Michael could just be a vessel to fill with pleasure instead of pain.

Normally skating his hand down to gently squeeze and massage his partner’s testicles was enough to get that hitched-curse and uncontrolled jerk in his mouth that signaled an impending orgasm. The draw and shiver of warm pliant skin before the hot, thick release in his mouth, except that was not happening.

After a firm swipe of his tongue against the slit, rubbing against the edge of the frenulum, another foolproof trick in his experience that garnered nothing more than a sigh and an absent clutch of the hand on the back of his neck, Michael pulled away abruptly to stare up at Kyle Valenti’s face. 

“Wait, why’d you stop?” 

Michael wiped his mouth with the back of his hand rocking back on his heels, his voice rough from his activities, “‘Cause you don’t seem to be into this? Which I gotta admit, that’s a mood killer for me and slightly hurtful to my pride.”

Instead of arguing with Michael over his observation, Kyle sighed guiltily and shifted to pull up his lightweight shorts over his erection, signalling the close of the encounter. “Sorry, you know you’re great at that, it’s me. My brain,” he gestured to his head with a twirling motion with his long-skilled surgeon hands. 

Michael couldn’t help but follow the motion with interest, he had always been a helpless sucker for a set of strong, confident hands.

Alex had hands like that.

Fuck, Michael pushed that thought away like he did every time it slipped in uninvited and collapsed next to Kyle on his expensive leather couch. It had been two years since Michael’s last glimpse of Alex, no contact from him outside of the impersonal birthday and holiday cards that had begun after Michael had mailed his ‘I’m sorry I dropped in your life without warning’ letter. They had officially been apart longer than they were together and still Michael couldn’t stop thinking of Alex daily.

Perhaps Kyle wasn’t the only one distracted tonight. 

“Listen, I won’t bore you with the details and break our agreement here,” Kyle continued, knocking his shoulder against Michael’s companionably. “I can still do you here-”

“‘Do me’, that’s so romantic, Valenti. I think I’ll pass on getting a disinterested handjob, thanks.” Michael rolled his eyes at the offer and reached for the bottle of water from the coffee table to swish around his mouth before swallowing for effect.

It was Kyle’s turn to roll his eyes but fondly. “I could give you an absent-minded blowjob instead?”

Their eyes met. Kyle lifted his well-groomed eyebrow with a leer as Michael pretended to be seriously tempted with a stroke of his stubbled jaw in turn before they both broke character and started to laugh helplessly.

If someone had told a seventeen-year-old Michael that one day he would be laughing with Kyle Valenti in his high-end, ultra modern condo after a failed conclusion to a ‘U up?’ text, well he probably would have been interested in the type of pharmaceutical high that would have made that possible. Hell, the Michael of a year ago, wouldn’t have believed it either but that was before he had met the post-med school Kyle that had returned home to Roswell.

It had started one night at the Wild Pony, where Michael had frequented more and more for the scraps of news about Alex from Maria. A practice she did her best to discourage, repeating her policy of ‘I don’t play messenger between exes’, which had given Michael hope that maybe _Alex_ had asked about him in turn. He had been one beer in, contemplating a second, when Jake Frederick’s sneer had interrupted.

“I hear they’re finally opening a place that caters just for the fags in town.”

That word, not unfamiliar to Michael in Roswell, brought his shoulders up to his ears. Its ugliness brought back so many memories of how it had been whispered, spat, scrawled, or just strongly implied whenever Michael and Alex had ventured outside the safety zone of the Crashdown or their own four walls. The Wild Pony, once Maria had bought it, was eventually added to the list, though it had some patrons that still thought otherwise.

On cue, Maria’s voice had barked from behind the bar, “Jake, you use that word again in here and you’re banned for life!”

There had been a titter of amusement as Jake’s crowd of admirers teased him for the call out, before an artificial apology had been offered in return. After a moment though, Michael could hear him perfectly well, Jake picked up his conversation, “It’ll be wall to wall fake wigs and limp wrists there, probably playing nothin’ but Alex Manes’s shitty music.”

The laughter had echoed, and Michael had started to reach for his wallet to pay for his beer. It had been clear that tonight’s entertainment was focused on Michael. He had thought at this point, without Jesse Manes drumming up hate for his son, that these bullies would finally move on to something new. Unimaginative pricks.

“Hey Guerin, you off to join your people at that gay bar?” Jake had called, noticing Michael’s departure. “Gonna find yourself someone new to ruin now that your boy left you?”

Closing his eyes as he had swept his hat over his curls, Michael had said a silent apology to 17-year-old Alex for breaking his promise on violence. He had turned, noting a few new faces gathered at the table, probably guys from the base with their short haircuts, along with a silent Wyatt Long. For all of Wyatt’s racist blustering, Michael had known that he had a queer cousin in Austin. Still, Michael had pasted a bright and fake smile on, “Those are my people at Planet 7, Jake, but how many times do I have to tell you? I’m not gay.” 

“My mistake, buddy. Must have been all the cocksucking you do that threw me off.”

Michael had laughed harshly, ignoring the movement in his peripheral, and stepped closer, his smile growing darker, “I’m bisexual, which means, not only will I feed you my dick, Jakey, but I’ll give it to your sister too. Just not at the same time. Unless you’re into that sort of thing? You look like your parents were into it…”

The slam of chairs fell backward as Jake had jumped to his feet at the insult. After that it had been more blurs of movement, jostling, and chaos as Maria had shouted in the background about the police while Michael had traded punches indiscriminately. At one point he had realized he had help against his back, as the fight had spilled outside into the cold, raw New Mexico night.

Dark spiked hair, a nice set of shoulders that gave Michael an inch or two of height advantage had been all he had registered in the melee. It hadn’t been until the breaking of glass that had been shortly echoed by the boom of a shotgun, that the fight had dropped into stillness and Michael had recognized his unsolicited ally as Kyle Valenti. 

Maria had stood next to the door of the Wild Pony as a lone siren picked up in the background, “All right you assholes, you’re all out of here. Drop your weapons and fucking leave before I have the sheriff lock all of you up!”

“Gotta admit, you’re kind of the last person I expected to be fighting a bigot,” Michael had commented, dabbing at a fiercely bleeding cut on his eyebrow. “Kinda remember it the other way around in high school.”

Kyle had smiled humorlessly as he caught his breath, grabbing Michael’s shoulder to pull him away from the bar toward the parking lot as the sirens picked up volume. “Well, I remember you as being some sort of secret genius in high school. Taking on five guys seems kind of dumb.”

“It was just four guys, Wyatt wasn’t gonna involve himself or else Maria would have called his uncle and aunt on him.”

“Oh well, if it was just four guys, I should have stayed at the bar, I wasn’t finished with my drink yet,” Kyle had quipped sarcastically, as he kept pulling Michael through the parked cars. “You’re welcome by the way.”

“Fuck off, I didn’t ask for help-” He had shaken off Kyle’s hand, his previous pliancy in following Kyle at an end as he bristled with indignation. Whatever strange amnesia over what a dick Kyle Valenti was in general and to Alex in particular had passed at the prod by Kyle for gratitude. “And my damn truck is over there-”

“Can you even see out of that eye? Yeah, I didn’t think so,” Kyle had answered for him and dug out a pair of keys from his pocket as an expensive sounding unlocking chirp echoed. Of course. The dark blue BMW in the sea of modest pick up trucks and domestic sedans had been his. At least it wasn’t the bright red Camaro from graduation, that car had too many associations with it for Michael. The hatch popped open on the X1, Kyle had leaned in to pull out a towel to toss to Michael. “I’ve got my bag here and I could use the practice in sutures, so?”

Normally the idea of a doctor touching him at all was enough to instill a mix of dread and panic, but Michael hadn’t seen anything in Kyle’s face other than genuine concern mixed with exasperation that night. The open air of the parking lot with police on the way had seemed like a bad idea. “All right, free medical care is hard to turn down, but I don’t want your dad arresting me, so can we-”

“Your place, it is.” And then as they’d driven in silence, with Michael still holding the towel against his cut, Kyle had spoken gently in the dark. “I was a dick in high school, I was even a dick in college. But then some things changed for me, um, so I’m glad Roswell is getting a gay bar.”

“No, no, high school homophobe does not come out as gay, not happening, no way-”

“No not gay,” Kyle had cut his eyes over to the passenger seat, giving Michael a quick up-and-down appraisal. “Just learned the package isn’t really that important to me. I like sex. Med school was a small pool of sleep-deprived, competitive people and I stopped caring if they had a dick or not. I also learned a lot about anatomy.”

The appraising look, the hint of good-natured humor in Kyle’s eyes, and his suggestive words had been all enough to push Michael to grunt, “Changed my mind, your place instead.” He never took anyone back to his Airstream as a rule.

And that had been the beginning of Michael’s almost-friends, only-benefits relationship with Kyle Valenti. It revolved around those unsaid rules from the first night, only at Kyle’s condo, and rarely did they engage in anything more substantive than talk about sports or the general stupidity of Roswell. The sex was easy, the conversation stayed light enough to fill the gaps of loneliness, and if Michael had been a different species, he might have considered it the start of something more permanent.

If only Max had been wrong. If only Michael hadn’t fallen in love with Alex as a teenager. The first year after Alex left had been devoted to trying to make it on his own financially and getting the down payment together for the Airstream. The next year he had tortured himself with believing that now that Alex was successful, he’d come back to Roswell, to him. Then after Isobel’s wedding and that trip east, Michael had had to accept the truth. Alex was gone.

Dating in the years since, women and the occasional out man, had changed nothing for Michael. It was still Alex filling his every odd thought, and especially his fantasies at night. Doomed indeed as Max had warned him, to drift through life enjoying the surface companionship of others but never wanting anything more because once upon a time a boy with smeared black eyeliner held him close in a tacky UFO museum. 

That reminder of what he did have currently, good sex and the ability to laugh with someone, loosened some of the private rules that Michael had kept to with Kyle. “So, I mean, you don’t have to, but if you want to talk about what’s on your mind, you can.” Michael tipped his head back against the couch to meet Kyle’s surprised expression. “It would make me feel better about my sexual prowess, okay? You nodding off during a blowjob hurts man.”

“Well, as long as it makes _you_ feel better,” Kyle teased sarcastically before accepting the offer made. “I was thinking about my dad.”

“Kinky but kinda gross, dude.”

“Ha ha, that’s real funny.” 

“Sorry, sorry, that was wide open.” Michael nudged his shoulder more seriously, “What about your dad?”

“He’s been acting weird lately. I actually thought he was drinking again,” Kyle waved his hand restlessly, “It’s an open secret around town that my dad has been on and off the wagon. Most cops have a close relationship with booze.”

The Roswell circle of repeated gossipry was wide enough to reach Sanders Auto, customers often needing to make some sort of conversation as they waited, so Michael was pretty familiar with the rumors about Jim Valenti. Most of them he ignored, like the infidelity whispers, because he could still remember the man showing up at Mimi Deluca’s house to offer Alex that first steady job in the face of Jesse’s smear campaign. An act that Jesse had retaliated against by sponsoring a challenger to the next year’s sheriff’s race.

For a police officer, Michael had cut Jim Valenti some slack in the character department. He also wasn’t a bad boss according to Max, though his brother’s opinion didn’t sway Michael as far as Jim’s act of kindness toward Alex had.

“You said you thought he was drinking again, but he’s not?”

“Well, my other suspicion was he was cheating on my mom.” Kyle met Michael’s concerned glance with a tired, dark smile. “Yeah, not a great thought to have, but he’s been disappearing a lot. Acting paranoid too, he always carries but I noticed he kept his sidearm on him during Sunday dinner in the house. Like he’s afraid someone is going to show up and attack him.”

“You think he was cheating with someone else who was married?” 

“I can’t really figure out what’s going on with him, other than he’s lying. But I followed him today, and he didn’t go to work, he drove a hundred miles north.” 

Michael blinked in reluctant admiration for Kyle’s tactics, “I guess you do pick up stuff with two cops as parents.” He racked his brain for something more to say, but his conversational skills had never been gifted to begin with outside of charming someone into bed. “Um, in my experience, cheaters stay close to home. Like coworker, favorite waitress, etc. it’s definitely weird for your dad to drive that far for a little something on the side.”

“That’s the thing, he’s all secretive but it's over something nostalgic. I followed him to some old prison my grandfather worked at in the 60s called Caulfield. It’s been shut down for years. I can’t figure it out, and short of asking him directly I doubt I will.” Kyle shook his head again before inching closer to Michael on the couch, with a slow growing knowing smile, “So now you know where my head was when-“

“When I was trying to give you head?” Michael snarked playfully, picking up the change in mood easily. Apparently talking it out loud had released whatever mental block Kyle had been struggling with before. The moment reminded him of how he used to hold Alex at night, listening to him vent over the various customers in his day before he was able to wind down enough to enjoy any intimate touch. 

Fuck. He was thinking about Alex again.

This time he let Kyle pulling him into a kiss distract him fully from the renewed spiral of remembrance. His body warmed slowly as Michael shut down his brain from wandering east again to Nashville. 

***

“Your soul and your heart have been in such opposition,” Mimi murmured, holding Michael’s palm between hers as she gave him a reading. It was his way of distracting her while Maria gently soothed two customers that had received a deep lecture about the sins on their souls. To be fair, Michael could tell from their demeanor and close cut hair that each of them had served in the military, so Mimi Deluca probably wasn’t too far wrong with her lecture. “I know you’re a traveler, child, but this pull north and east could tear you in two.”

“My heart hasn’t been mine for a while,” Michael replied truthfully. Once he and Alex had moved in with one another, the small family of outcasts with Alex, Maria and Mimi had expanded to include him for a while. And once upon a time it had boasted more members like Rosa and Liz, but his sister’s actions had trimmed those branches in one way or another.

“That’s the east, and while it travels ever closer to you, you’ll never get that back. But north though, if you follow that path, perhaps your soul will find peace.”

“Not sure what I’d do with peace.”

“Maybe pay your bar tab once in a while?” Maria injected as she moved back behind the bar with a gentle hand on her mother’s shoulder. “And not starting a fight in my bar would also be a good start.”

“Come on, Deluca, I have been a very good boy since that last go-around with Jake. I swear that kid is a closet case with how badly he seems to want me to lay hands on him,” Michael protested weakly. Truly he had only bent his old promise to Alex a handful of times in the last year and all of them because the Fredrickson kid had brought up Alex in some way. The comments about his job, clothes, and cheap taste in booze could all be ignored, but one word about Alex’s music or success and the gloves came off.

“Maria! Don’t be so mean to Michael, his people aren’t designed to live like this, divided in two.”

Despite the chill from Mimi’s words, Michael knew that Maria didn’t take her mother’s talk too seriously with how often she peppered her premonitions with nineties alien blockbuster movies. She always interpreted her mother’s words as being a romantic metaphor about a lost love. 

Suddenly Mimi straightened, looking over Michael’s shoulder. “I guess good can come from evil dying.”

In the mirror over the bar, he caught sight of what Mimi saw. A grip closed over his heart, squeezing it until the fluttering motion ceased under the stranglehold-force as he watched Alex Manes move confidently through the crowd toward the front where Michael was with Maria. His head was shaved close up the back, leaving a long, silky dark fringe over one eye and his face was bare of makeup and piercings. The black shirt he sported had long sleeves made of crisscrossed fabric, draping the shirt tail over a pair of tight black jeans that looked more at home on Rodeo Drive than Roswell. It was the completely indifferent look on Alex’s face that showed he didn’t care about fitting in to the locals bar.

Fuck, it was so quintessentially Alex’s attitude from high school, from before the shed, that Michael was having trouble remembering it had been at least seven years. 

“Alex Manes, in my bar!” Maria squealed excitedly, vaulting herself over the bar in one smooth motion to cross the distance and throwing herself into his open arms. 

Michael’s mouth was dry as he picked up his drink to take a sip, feeling awkward and out of place. Should he offer his hand to shake? A hug? Could he pretend to be European and kiss Alex’s cheeks? What were the rules on greeting an ex that he traded Hallmark cards with now? 

A soft cool touch on his hand pulled him back from his spiraling thoughts, and he looked up into Mimi Deluca’s clear and strangely focused gaze. “He sings in the wrong key every night to strangers about love, but you know his song in your heart. That’s the notebook he used to write it. Oh, you know you’re such a good boy, you’re not rotten inside like your sister.”

Before he could do more than blink at her knowledge of Isobel, Alex was suddenly next to them. His familiar dark eyes looked at Mimi’s hand covering his curiously before smiling at Michael. “I would have thought you’d be tired of this place, after all those nights waiting for me to finish my shift?”

“Alex,” Michael took a deep breath, floundering for something more than the obvious, “you’re here. In Roswell.”

“I am. It wasn’t really my idea,” Alex admitted gently, before taking a seat next to him. He reached smoothly for Michael’s glass to steal a drink from before making a face at what he found in the glass. “Oh man, it’s been a long time since I’ve had Crown Royal.” He fished out an expensive wallet to pull a crisp hundred dollar bill from a stack to lay on the bar, “Maria, please rescue him from this with some good tequila and maybe join us?”

Mimi gave Michael a significant look of encouragement before interjecting, “Actually, Maria, honey you should let these two get reacquainted, Alex isn’t going anywhere for a while. Jesse is dying, but he’s not dying today or even tomorrow.”

Michael jerked his head toward Alex, “That’s why you’re back? It’s your dad?” He couldn’t even be disappointed to learn that, because outside of the greeting cards they exchanged, Michael knew that Roswell was firmly in Alex’s rear view with the buzz of success increasing in Nashville over his talent. Roswell couldn’t compete with that, there was no draw here for Alex, especially not a small town mechanic with his reputation.

A small smile of satisfaction twitched over Alex’s mouth before he nodded in confirmation, “Brain tumor. Doctor says he might have a month, maybe less. I’m only here because my brother threatened to go to the press if I didn’t show up at his side to play the devoted son and my agent is worried about how that would look before my album release.”

“Oh.” Michael picked up his fresh drink, a high end alcohol he could have never dreamed of ordering for himself, out of a need to do something with his hands to keep from reaching out to touch Alex. “If I said that it sucks for you that he’s dying, I’d be lying, but I’m glad you’re here.”

“Yeah, it’s good to see you too, Michael.” Alex clinked his glass against Michael’s softly, “I’ve been back for a couple of days, this was the first time I could get away actually. The movies all lied you know, cancer isn’t this quiet death. My dad is ranting and raving all night long, about aliens, about being murdered, about all sorts of random shit about Roswell and the crash from ‘47 and hands that kill. Your name has kept coming up too. Guess he’s never forgiven us for being together.” Unaware of just how hard Michael’s heart was pounding, Alex continued with a mean shade in his voice, “But you know, I should record his rants and put it on youtube. Might make him famous, like it did me.”


	6. This Hard Truth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fic prompt: “Are you drunk?”

The solid black Mercedes Benz SUV with dark tinted windows that was parked in front of his Airstream didn’t surprise Michael in the least. 

It had been three days since Jesse Manes had succumbed to his terminal cancer diagnosis, those final days silent under a steady morphine drip. The doctors had been correct with their less than a month pronouncement which had left Michael with the uncomfortable position of hoping that Jesse was going to defy those odds. It would have been a win-win of extended suffering for a man who had earned that and it would have kept Alex in Roswell longer.

He had seen Alex exactly seven times since that first night at the Wild Pony, all of them casual spontaneous encounters that had become less spontaneous after he’d learned the nursing rotation of the Manes brothers and home care staff. He’d shuffled his jobs at the garage to leave openings in his schedule and stopped eating at home during the nights he knew Alex would be free, emptying out his dining out jar to create opportunities to run into him at the Crashdown or the Pony. 

This was a species thing, he had reminded himself as a curl of guilt had started to squirm inside him at the level of low-key stalking he had done to see his ex. Between Max’s somber admission that he still could remember in crystal-clear detail the day Liz Ortecho touched his lip almost eight years ago in high school and the reaction one of Michael’s attempts at dating had had to his story of showing up on Alex’s doorstep two years after a breakup with no warning; well he was aware this wasn’t a normal intensity. The date with wide eyes, picking up their phone, even though it hadn’t made a noise, saying, “You seem like a nice guy, but I need to take this call, it’s probably work, we can try again some other time-” It had been utterly transparent in their need to escape Michael’s presence.

That was the proper, sane reaction to his story he had learned, not nodding sagely like Max had and encouraging him to go in the first place. 

Humans couldn’t calculate within a minute the amount of time they had recently spent with someone the way Michael could. It was a full commitment of energy to stay carefully friendly with Alex, to keep his alien focus under wraps even though he had probably tipped his cards that day in Nashville. On his good days, he told himself that Alex hadn’t called the cops on him because he’d been happy to see Michael and on his bad days, it was because he hadn’t wanted the press that reporting his poor, blue-collar, ex would bring. 

With Jesse Manes dead, Alex’s reasons for staying in Roswell were over. It was time to say goodbye to this small interlude of where Michael felt completely like himself, brimming in mitochondrial buoyancy with every cell alive and sparkling just from knowing Alex was near. Back to the cards of Hallmark blandness and the short notes of congratulations after a song did well on the charts.

Alex looked up from his casual sprawl in the lawn chair, his phone in hand, and smiled warmly at Michael’s approach, “Thought I might return the favor, and show up at your door unannounced. I gotta say, an Airstream at Sanders’ was not what I was expecting as Casa de Guerin.”

Suddenly aware of the dark stain of dirt in his cuticles, Michael shoved his hands in his pockets as he strolled up to him. Everywhere he looked was a reminder of the financial divide, from the shiny Mercedes G-Class to the smooth manicure and high-end clothing that wrapped around Alex’s trim but well-built frame. “What did you expect then, bedroll in my truck again?”

“Whoa,” Alex stood up, pocketing his phone to hold his hands up harmlessly. “Sorry, that’s not what I meant, I was referring to the doctor boyfriend you’ve got. Most doctors I’ve met are about the trappings, the rat race to keep up with the Jones. But hey, it looks like you found a good one that likes you for you.” Alex’s smile wavered, “And I’m happy for you.”

Now even more off-balanced, Michael sputtered, “Wait, I don’t-”

“I’m less happy it’s Kyle Valenti, but I guess it’s possible he’s changed, or maybe he received a personality transplant-”

“What the fuck! Who have you been talking to?” he finally cut in, looking over his shoulder back to the office at the auto yard, half expecting to see Isobel being helpful. She had never quite forgiven Alex for finding happiness in Nashville because at some point over the years she had decided that Alex made for a tempering effect on Michael’s murderous instincts from high school. Trading her fear that he would snap and kill Alex for confidence that it was only Alex keeping him check made for an uncomfortable transaction. Then there was her increased scrutiny on Michael's emotional stability after Alex had left. That had hurt, still he kept silent about the truth to preserve the secret. He wouldn’t have put it past her to spin a version of events to make Alex jealous as payback. 

As if that was possible, even in a universe where Michael was capable of being a Stepford boyfriend worthy of a doctor. Nothing he had compared to the life Alex had built without him. Not even zero-percent body fat doctors who did know quite a bit about anatomy to ensure a mind-blowingly good orgasm. Alex’s mention of Kyle did remind Michael that he hadn’t heard very much from him since that night shortly before Alex had rolled into town. 

“We’ve seen each other a few times now, Alex, I would have told you if I had a boyfriend. Anyway, Kyle has changed, but he’s not- we’re weirdly enough friends.”

A pang of longing shot through him at seeing Alex arch his eyebrow at him in judgment. “That is not what Maria says, or Arturo, or Old Man Sanders for that matter.”

“Well, they are wrong,” Michael said firmly, stepping around Alex leaving a careful amount of space as he flipped open the lid of his cooler for a beer. “It’s not like that okay? I don’t have a Dennis and a dog in my life, it’s casual and fun but nothing more.”

“I wish I was sad about hearing that, but I’m not.” 

Michael paused in the middle of popping the cap off his bottle, “Wow, thank you.” That stung more than he was expecting to hear that Alex was happy he was alone. Fame and fortune really did change people. Swallowing the lump in his throat, “Listen, I’ve loved seeing you Alex, and the less said about your dad the better, so thanks for coming by to say goodbye and eh, enjoy Nashville,” he grabbed the knob on his Airstream door to flee with the tattered remains of his heart in his throat. Being an alien just sucked sometimes.

A hand covered his, keeping the door firmly closed against the frame. Michael cursed his species for the thousandth time as the touch sent waves of weakness through him. Alex leaned in close, too close for just friendly words, “Wait, that came out wrong.”

“Did it?”

“Yes,” Alex stated firmly. He held onto Michael’s hand, stepping into the space between them to block the retreat into the Airstream. This was the closest they had been to one another in four years, not since that last fight the morning before Alex’s flight east that had ended with fucking on a bare mattress after Michael had packed their sheets for Alex to take. “Coming back here, seeing everyone, um, seeing you, it reminded me of who I was before I became this guy,” he gestured at his clothes and back toward the expensive car vaguely. “I’ve got all these things now, useless things, that when I look in the mirror, I see my dad, a guy who cared more about a uniform than he did his own kids.” 

“Alex, you could never be him, I don’t care if you become more famous than McCartney, it’s just not possible.”

Whatever Alex saw on his face made him shake his head gently in response, “I don’t get it, you still look at me like you did when we were dumb kids surviving on ramen, like nothing’s changed at all.” 

“ _Nothing_ has changed for me,” Michael insisted firmly, bringing the open and almost forgotten beer to his lips. A meager shield to employ. It was pretty clear that nothing ever would and that was his reality. It was as true now as it was when he had borrowed a guitar from the music room at seventeen. “But you knew that already, that’s why we broke up, remember? Things were changin’ for you, you were goin’ to bigger places than Roswell, and that’s a good thing. A great thing even. I’m happy for you. You made it.”

“I know. You should know that I’m not going back to Tennessee right now, Michael. Probably not for a while.” 

“What?”

“There’s no Dennis, I mean, not anymore. That kinda fizzled out after your visit, and the dog was his,” Alex kept his hand over Michael’s, slowly moving it up to circle his fingers around his wrist, “I do miss the dog, she was sweet.”

“Your house-” Michael started, his pulse was back to pounding senselessly in his ears.

“That was mine but I sublet it to a guy I know who’s doing session work at the studio while I was here. I just let him convert the sublet into a lease.”

“And your agent?”

“Dealing with the fact I’m taking my first sabbatical in four years,” Alex finished smoothly, an answer ready for every disbelieving question that Michael could muster about his house and life. He took a step back, as if he was suddenly aware of how he had crowded him against the warm metal door of the Airstream.

There was just one question left to ask though, as Michael studied Alex’s face intently. The transparent way his eyes kept flickering from the beer bottle against Michael’s mouth and then away. “If you’re not here to say goodbye to me, then why are you here?” he asked challengingly, raising his beer back to his mouth to finish with a full lipped suggestive swallow.

Gauntlet dropped and accepted as Alex surged forward to press Michael against the door, kissing him. The glass bottle dropped uselessly to the ground, glancing off the metal steps as Michael reached behind him to turn the knob quickly. He stepped backward, letting Alex crowd him through the doorway, chasing his mouth hungrily.

The metal door slapped hard against the door jamb, as Michael fell back onto his mattress. 

Alex gulped audibly for air from the break, pulling back to tug off his v-neck shirt over his head and then stilled as he took in the state of Michael’s small bed. His eyes widened, scrutinizing the setup and Michael had to look away in embarrassment, knowing exactly what Alex had just recognized. “You are a goddamn liar! When I said I didn’t want our sheets to take with me, you said you were going to burn them!”

“Yeah, well, it seemed wasteful to do that.” 

Michael leaned back on the thin mattress, ripping his own shirt off to toss carelessly on the floor. He watched as Alex reached down to unbutton his pants. The yellow light from the trailer window brushed a gold glow of Alex’s half naked torso. He drank in the small, subtle changes in Alex’s body, like the corded strength in his torso that spoke of some sort of workout routine. Probably yoga or dancing maybe. The playful outrage on Alex’s face slowly changed over to a dawning realization as he took in more of the details of the small and cramped surroundings. It wasn’t just the still-present sheets that migrated to the Airstream.

This was why Michael had never brought anyone back here. 

All around were the skeleton remains of that first apartment they had shared together. The same dishes, but now they clustered around a tiny sink, forever with just one plate and glass out. The same cheap poster advertising Warp Tour was taped above the wooden built-in dresser. The same stupid classic car clock that Alex had brought home, after Maria had bought the Wild Pony and upgraded the decor, all because he said the cars reminded him of Michael. 

Everywhere in the Airstream was some piece of memorabilia from those three years together. It was as close to a shrine to their relationship that Michael could build without setting out candles and a full altar. It had barely come close to soothing his half-empty soul at night, when he had wondered just what Alex was doing or worse, who.

“Holy shit, you really do love me. Still.”

“Uh, yeah,” Michael rubbed at the back of his head ruefully, before laying back to accept Alex’s warm weight over him. He closed his eyes as Alex kissed him, turning his head upward as those long, musician fingers tangled in his hair. Gasping softly, he confessed helplessly under Alex’s spell, “Never did figure out how to stop.” 

“My dad was wrong, I mean, I knew he was- but he was so convinced that your species weren’t capable of it-” Alex stopped abruptly, aware almost immediately that Michael had gone rigid under him. 

Dimly Michael realized that Alex was still talking but nothing registered for him after ‘your species’. It was subterfuge earlier, when Alex had joked that first night about his father being a lunatic lost in the ravages of a brain tumor. He had apparently believed Jesse, and worse Alex seemed to know that Jesse was right, that Michael was different. A whole different species.

Cool palms cupped Michael’s face, pulling him away from his spiraling thoughts and back to the Airstream. Any hope Michael had of laughing off the panicked response he had was gone with the serious look in Alex’s eyes. “Hey. I don’t care, okay? You are still the first person, hell the only person, I’ve ever loved completely. Where you came from doesn’t matter to me. I know who you are-”

“And you know what I am.” It wasn’t a question. 

“Yes.”

*** 

Michael stared up at the ceiling of his trailer not daring to look sideways at Alex, who was pressed as close he could get against Michael on the narrow bunk. After a soft acknowledgement that he had known that Michael wasn’t alone, that he’d figured out that Max and Isobel had to be the same, even though his father had died believing only Michael was an alien, Michael had told him everything. 

The crash, the pod, the years in the system, the knowledge that he was different and the fear that came with that knowledge. The fact he had powers, that they all had. The joy he had in finding Max and Isobel again at eleven even though he didn’t trust why he felt that way toward them. Then the vow they had made for absolute secrecy. “Not even Noah knows about Isobel, and they’ve been married four years now.”

“And Max? He never told anyone either?”

“His partner knows; Jenna Cameron, but that wasn’t planned. They were driving back to the station after a long circuit patrol for speeders and got caught up rescuing some people from a flash flood. The Berrendo. Cam got hit by a tree branch, femoral artery, and yeah, Max healed her. No one saw him because it was a dark night, but healing leaves a handprint. Impossible to deny it.”

Alex ran his hand absently through Michael’s chest hair, soothing them both. “It was a relief when my dad had Flint show me the evidence.”

“A relief?” Michael joked weakly, his mouth twitching upward in the effort. “Low-key worried now that learning I’m an alien was a relief to you.”

“I thought the novelty of being with me had worn off. I mean, my choice after telling the Air Force to fuck off was starving to death or splitting expenses with you for rent. I figured after 3 years, you were ready to move on, so you just let me go.” Alex reached up to cover Michael’s mouth with his palm briefly. “I know how that sounds, but you have to understand, before you? No one had ever loved me. My mom left when I was eight. I mean, maybe my older brothers did for a bit when I was little and cute? At least until I was thirteen and my dad started singling me out. He would kick my ass in front of them, daring them to protest, and they didn’t. By the time I hit high school, I didn’t even love me.”

“Alex.” Heartbreak was in every syllable. “I never wanted to let you go-”

“I know, I’m just saying, I could finally believe it when Flint handed me a piece of a 70-year-old spaceship.”

“Dropping in on you with no warning a couple of years ago wasn’t a clue?”

Alex pursed his lips together, and laid his head on Michael’s shoulder. “Honestly I had spent two years telling myself that you didn’t give a shit, and then when you showed up, I thought it was because I was making a name. All sorts of people come out of the woodwork when the first taste of fame comes along. Then you confused me, because you left and started sending me these terribly boring greeting cards.”

“Fuck off, I spent forever picking out those cards,” Michael protested with a laugh. “I was trying to show you that I had some chill, that I wouldn’t boil a bunny or stalk your social media, like some obsessed ex of yours.”

“Well you succeeded, I did keep all your cards though. It might have been a factor for Dennis moving out,” Alex joked in return before sobering with a tired sigh. “But little did you know, the real stalkers here, were my family. Ever since 1947, a Manes man has been tasked in protecting humanity from your kind, starting with my great-grandfather Harlan, and ending with my brother Flint.”

Michael echoed the sigh, tucking Alex closer to him in the narrow bed. The idea of the government, especially the United States Military, believing in aliens was enough to send his pulse rattling upward with fear. Every fear he’d had as a kid made real. 

“On the bright side, my dad is dead, so that’s one less Manes hunting you.”

“What’s the other side?”

“I thought my brother was in Germany except he’s been stateside for the last few years working with my dad. He’s a weapons expert, and he’s so important to the project, that the military forwarded his mail to Germany for the proper postmarks.”

“Well fuck.”

*** 

The next day, Michael took a rare sick day from work and guided Alex out to the desert to the cave to show him the pods, where his story had begun according to his memory. Then it was Alex’s turn for show and tell, as he directed Michael to the abandoned air base outside of town.

“I don’t know if we’ll be able to get in, but Flint calls it Project Shepherd. It was Dad’s center of operations in Roswell. He tapped into all the traffic cameras and even planted one on the gate to Sanders’ Auto,'' Alex explained as he stepped out of his Mecedes SUV. “You fixing cars must have bored the shit out of him.”

Weeds and scrub grass covered the broken pavement of the air base, lending to the air of disuse. The huge metal hangers covered the expanse, the domed tin roofs punctuated the horizon like a scattered group of D’s. Michael scanned the surroundings, a feeling of disquiet and dread filling his veins. It was probably the height of foolishness to visit a top secret bunker with only the company of a musician as back up, even if he did have the last name of Manes.

A dark shadow caught his eye, and frowned as he realized that they weren’t the only ones on sight. A familiar dark blue BMW was parked off to the side, mostly hidden by a building named B unimaginatively. As he crossed the parking lot with Alex a step behind, skipping over the broken slabs of paving markers, he drew to a halt in front of an open door.

Michael started forward, but Alex slapped his hand over his arm to halt him, “You should let me go first-”

“What, no!”

“I’m human, what if there’s some sort of anti-alien trap down there?”

“And you’re human, so what makes you think you’ll trip it?” Michael shot back reasonably, shaking off Alex’s hold. “If there’s a trap, I’m the one with the lock pick in my brain, besides, I think I know who’s down there.”

“This is like every bad horror movie, Michael.” 

But outside of that pronouncement, Alex let him take the lead down the stairs of the open bunker into the cool shadows of the underground facility. As predicted, he made it down uneventfully and found exactly who he had expected at the bottom, spinning around in a slow circle in a leather covered office chair.

“Did you know they’re selling a shirt at Planet 7 that says ‘I’ve been probed by an alien’? I should buy it, because I can wear it unironically,” Kyle greeted as Michael made it to the bottom of the staircase. He shut his mouth comically as he realized that Michael wasn’t alone, “Whoops, did I just blow your secret like I’ve blown you?”

In Michael’s experience with Kyle, working the almost-friends and all-benefits angle, he had seen him in a lot of states. Worn out from a long shift at the hospital, solemn because he’d lost a patient, giggly because of Michael’s tendency toward wild bedhead, horny strangely because of a good football game, and finally tipsy after a pair of IPAs. He had never seen Kyle in this state.

“Are you drunk?” Michael asked, disbelievingly even though there was a mostly empty bottle of bourbon on the long conference table, stretching along the width of the room under the fluorescent lights.

“I am very drunk. That is the only sane response to my dad, I mean my day, actually I had that right the first time, my dad.” Kyle nodded vigorously before looking over Michael’s shoulder, “Hi Alex Manes. I’m sorry I was a homophobic jackass in high school. I have really changed. Ask your ex. Or is it current? Am I the ex now? Are we both Michael’s ex? Exes? Fuck is that plural or possessive-”

“You are definitely an ex now,” Alex answered firmly.

“Holy shit you are wasted,” Michael shook his head, slightly amused in spite of the deep alarm he felt in finding Kyle Valenti deep in the command center of an alien hunting operation. It was hard to feel too afraid considering the words pouring from Kyle’s mouth unedited. 

“Listen I changed myself okay? I did the hard work examining my privilege and toxic masculinity. I did it because I like sucking dick as much as I like eating pussy, but also because my dad is a good person and I wanted to make him proud. But I was fucking wrong. Not about sucking dick, that’s great, but my dad, he’s not good, Michael, he is really not who I thought he was,” Kyle pronounced seriously with the steady emphasis of the inebriated. He staggered over to a computer system to press a key, pulling up a surveillance camera of a nondescript building on the set of command monitors. “He runs an alien GITMO in his spare time.” The outside image clicked over, showing a line of cells, including an image of an all-too familiar man, “And he had Jesse Manes killed by an alien.”


	7. This Hard Heart (1/2)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Part 1 of the conclusion.
> 
> Fic prompt: “I’m only here to establish an…ali-bi.”

“So what are we going to do?”

Michael cringed at the obvious question that he had hoped Alex wouldn’t ask. The television was on mute, the only sound in Alex’s rented house was the drunken snoring coming from the guest bedroom while Kyle slept off his what-is-my-life bender. His eyes barely took in the CNN spectacle of a reality television host descending an escalator to announce his candidacy for President. The man never won an Emmy, but yet he thought he had the resume to lead after losing entertainment awards to bickering couples on travel. The message of fear of others and the release of responsibility for class stagnation, the ‘it’s not your fault if you don’t have things, it’s all given to minorities now’ speech making wasn’t playing as poorly as expected.

His people had picked a great planet to crash-land on, ruled by scared people who imprisoned crash survivors instead of helping them. All of the details about Caulfield that Kyle had shared made his day-drinking not only reasonable but medicinal. Almost seventy years of incarceration and experimentation, and the government was the villain.

The universal story of subjugation on these shores since 1619.

They weren’t alone here on this planet kept circling his thoughts, through the maze of fear; the government knows, and the anger over the operation of Caulfield. Through decades of action, through presumably routine staff changes, and the secret had survived intact until Jim Valenti had finally seen the futility of keeping now elderly beings captive. 

Alex pressed a cup of hot tea into Michael’s hand before taking a seat next to him on the too-firm couch, part of the aesthetically pleasing but functionally miserable furniture of staged homes. It was a relief to know that Alex had settled in a rental instead of the Manes family home. He couldn’t imagine retreating to the small confines of his Airstream after glimpsing the grayscale video images of narrow cells, he definitely did not want to ask Flint Manes where Jesse kept the extra toilet paper for the bathroom. With Kyle too drunk to remember his passcode to his condo’s security gate, Alex had stepped in smoothly to offer his help.

For all of the challenges, at least this planet had Alex. 

“Do you have any suggestions?” Michael asked, holding the cup between his palms for warmth. His people had survived. They were alive. The answers to all of his questions were kept behind 8×10 glass walled cells one hundred miles away under the guard of the military. “Despite my origins, I didn’t come pre-programmed with a plan to violently overthrow the government but, God, I want to right now.”

The weak joke brought a smile to Alex’s lips before he sighed. “Obviously, well we can’t leave it alone. We’ve got to break them out of there. Your people have suffered entirely too long locked up.”

“Sure, after we bust open the prison, then what? Long term confinement has some serious side effects, like on health and psychologically.” Michael met Alex’s surprised lift of an eyebrow at his knowledge with a small shrug. He wasn’t about to get into the dark and dirty history of his sister’s actions at 17, that he might have gamed out scenarios where Isobel paid for her crime in a mental hospital or prison. “I’ve known I was different since I was 7, so I might have thought about what life in a cage would be like a few thousand times. If I was lucky it would be alien autopsy time.”

“You never did like watching alien movies.”

“It seemed like every foster placement I had carried a copy of ‘Independence Day.’” Michael placed the now cold tea on the coffee table and lifted his arm up for Alex in invitation. He wasn’t close to having had his fill of touching and holding him, despite the dark, almost world-ending circumstances hovering over them. As Alex snuggled close to him, Michael could feel all the jagged rough pieces inside him start to smooth over and knit together seamlessly.

“Oh shit,” Alex groaned in remembrance, “I was so obsessed with ‘District 9’! I’m so sorry, fuck, how did you put up with me?” 

“That’s what you’re sorry about? Not the number of times you subjected me to that bootleg copy of ‘Cowboys versus Aliens’?” Michael teased him gently taking the reprieve from the heavy subjects. 

Turning his face up toward Michael, they stared at one another for a long moment before they both busting out together with “But Daniel Craig!”

For a moment, Michael forgot about everything but what it felt like to have Alex in his arms laughing helplessly again. The furnishings were too nice to maintain the illusion for long but if Michael squinted he could imagine they were back in their old apartment, watching the Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson and eating cold burritos from the Crashdown. Those nights when they were so tired from working that everything was funny, when the only way to stop from giggling was to kiss one another into silence. Then the silence, lasting only for a moment, before arousal and need would take over. Before they knew it, the neighbors would then start banging on the wall, starting the loop of laughter all over again.

Their love had always been the pharos in the dark, shouldering despair far enough away that they could persevere together in the light.

“What are you thinking about?” Alex asked softly, watching Michael’s face closely.

 _That I was stupid not to follow you to Nashville. That how was it possible that I lasted this long without you. I will never let you go again. Please don’t leave. Please stay forever._ Instead, Michael pushed those words down, and cracked a slight smile. “That my bisexual awakening started with Casino Royale, an ocean, and blue swim trunks.”

“You liar, you said it was me.”

“It was mostly you, and like, thirteen percent, Daniel Craig.” He rocked back on the couch, completely content in being absolutely ruined by watching Alex roll his eyes at him. 

“My gay awakening was Ben McKenzie in a white muscle shirt, something you definitely benefited from later on,” Alex commented with a waggle of his eyebrows, and then he turned toward the open bedroom door. “And maybe thirteen percent the fault of the guy sleeping in my guest room.”

Michael caught the speculative look in Alex’s eyes as his attention flickered from the guest room and back to him. “You know that’s over now, right?” 

Alex shrugged seemingly unbothered, “We’ve got bigger fish to fry than you and my high school bully being fuck buddies. Though that was the drama I was prepared for actually. My dad being a paranoid alien hunter was one thing, I figured with him dead it was over, you were safe, my brother could finally find his own path, and we could talk it out. But a military run alien prison? I did not expect that.”

The rock settled back on Michael’s chest again as he worked through Alex’s original question of what to do next. He stared down at his hands, rubbing his thumb over the ruined rough scar that stretched over the frozen crooked fingers, all courtesy of Jesse Manes. Had he known what Michael was in that moment, when he targeted his hand? Michael had always chalked it up to a sick sense of poetic justice, that he had dared to touch Jesse’s son, but now he wondered. Both Max and now another alien had their power concentrated in their hands, healing and death.

“I’m so glad he’s dead.” Alex’s gaze was locked onto Michael’s hand. He had watched with Michael the video of that elderly alien, reaching with greedy hands toward Jesse’s head and had stayed completely silent. Just a small smile of satisfaction of seeing his father drop to the floor of that cell and start weeping openly. Jesse Manes had known that he was a dead man in that moment.

“Yeah, not sure if I should shake Jim Valenti’s hand for pushing your dad into that cell or punch him in the face for keeping my people in cages in the first place.” Michael flexed his fingers again, pushing away the old pain that sparked when he focused on the shape of his left ring finger, impossibly too swollen to ever wear a future wedding band comfortably. “Where was his bravery when I was seven, and we were found by that trucker? Do I thank him for not bundling me into a cell?” 

Despite everything, Jim Valenti did earn a share of goodwill for murdering Jesse Manes, so Michael was only mostly joking about punching the man. Not even Max would be able to lift him out of the hot water assaulting a police officer would bring, let alone hitting the sheriff of Chaves County, his boss. “I don’t know how Max is going to take this news, he really looks up to him as some sort of mentor.”

“He should take the news with booze!” Kyle called from the bedroom, his voice rough and worn. There was a muttered “fuck”, the thump of feet hitting the floor before he appeared in the doorway, his hair disheveled and clothing wrinkled. He blinked a few times, looking at Michael and Alex with confusion before glancing back at the bedroom, visibly more perplexed. “Okay did I dream that or did I actually float into this house? Also, hi Alex Manes. Nice digs. Sorry my dad killed your dad.”

“You’re really stuck on that whole murder thing,” Alex observed wonderingly. 

Michael glanced over at Alex curiously, he’d long heard him talk about growing up with Kyle and the positive influence that Jim Valenti had had as a father figure, but he wondered if that had happened in the reverse. Did Kyle have any idea of what sort of man Jesse Manes was, especially toward his youngest son? In Roswell, the town itself was split between honoring him like a war hero despite his largely state-side service or fearing him, but no one claimed to love the departed master sergeant outside of his sons. Even then the Manes boys were split 50-50 on that.

“I don’t know if you’ve heard, but I’m a doctor now, they pay me to save people not kill them.” 

“I would argue that Jesse wasn’t ‘people’, so he hardly counts, but to answer your question, yeah, you floated in here.” Michael waggled his fingers at Kyle in answer. “If you scroll back in your freakout and just before you took that bender, you’ll remember you learned I was an alien too-”

Kyle moved his hand down from where it was currently clutching his temple to flash a stop sign at Michael. “Right. My dad, the sheriff, is a vigilante, aliens are real, and I’ve slept with one. When I’ve had more coffee, you and I are going to have a talk about how your personal biological history affects your sexual partner, Guerin, specifically about any dangers surrounding the swallowing of alien sperm.”

An impressive scowl marred Alex’s face at the reminder of their sexual history, causing Michael to bite his cheek hard to hold back an inappropriate giggle. “Sure thing, Doc, but I think you’ve had a really close and hands-on look at me. My species is pretty indistinguishable from yours, other than I don’t get sick.”

“You do run hot,” Alex put in, placing his palm over Michael’s knee in an unsubtle manner. Alex Manes, successful Nashville songwriter and drop-dead gorgeous as ever, was actually jealous? Michael had never in his life been an object for competition, in fact it had been quite the opposite experience crashing from one foster home to another. Perhaps he should mention to Alex how his species seemed to bond for life and what that actually meant for them, that he had nothing to worry about but Michael still wasn’t sure if the news would be welcome or creepy for Alex to learn. The alien reveal seemed to be a lot on its own.

“He does! Plus there’s this smell, like, it’s like,-” 

“Rain. He smells like rain.”

Kyle snapped his fingers at Alex in agreement, “Yes!”

It was Michael’s turn to feel vaguely uncomfortable at being discussed. Trading observations on his body felt entirely too close to his two exes (well one ex and one hopefully not-an-ex any longer) trading details about sex, and that was never a good thing in his experience. He jumped to his feet in what he hoped was a casual move, and grabbed his phone from the table. “All right, now that you’re upright Kyle, I’m going to call Max and Isobel, let them know what’s going on, so we can plan what’s next.”

He fled the living room quickly, catching Kyle’s question to Alex, “I just realized you wrote a whole song about his smell, oh my god, that one about how love smells like rain and rusted out Chevys, that’s so emo, dude--”

Kyle would have been interested to know that aliens could and did blush just as hard as humans.

***

“It’s been too long, what if she’s hurting him? Do we even know what the long term effects are on humans with alien mind control-”

Michael winced at Max’s annoyed glance, reminded again about how little his brother thought of Kyle Valenti, past and present, before he placed his hand on Kyle’s arm to attempt to calm him. Seated stiffly in one of the formal dining room chairs, knee to knee with Isobel, was Jim Valenti, currently caught in her mindspace as she examined his intentions. Candles were lit all around lending an otherworldly glow to the scene.

The candles were not there for a psychic atmosphere. 

Meanwhile, Alex was in the kitchen, on the phone to an electrician, while Max’s partner Jenna Cameron swept up the broken glass from the ceiling pod lights. The revelation that his boss was aware of who and what he had triggered what Michael called a ‘Max Special’. Localized electrical brown-out, and as a result, Alex was unlikely to get his deposit back on the house after they lit all the ‘decorative’ candles for light.

“Hey remember Coach Collins?” Michael prodded Kyle.

Not taking his eyes off the scene in front of him, Kyle replied distractedly, “What?”

“You wanted to know about the long term effects on humans, I’m tryin’ to tell you. Isobel never attended gym class for a reason and Coach Collins is just fine.”

“Are you telling me your alien sister- wait, of course she would. She was also homecoming queen as a freshman. Jesus. Did she mind-warp the whole school?” 

“She’s pretty and white, she didn’t need to do the _whole_ school. It’s more of a nudge, people doin’ what they really wanted to do in the first place. Your dad wanted to be up front with us.'' Michael squeezed Kyle’s arm in acknowledgment before letting go. “So you see? Coach is fine, and so will your dad be. You’ve got nothin’ to worry about.”

“Unless your dad is planning to round us up,” Max put in quietly with crossed arms. The secret expanding to include three more people was still not sitting well, even though Max had been somewhat resigned in knowing that Alex was one of three. Their past relationship, the way Alex had helped temper Michael’s feelings toward Max after graduation, had bought a lot of goodwill with Max.

“He’s not,” Isobel replied, suddenly coming out of her still trance. She immediately reached for her handbag to dig out a bottle of nail polish remover to drink from, causing Kyle to make an aborted move to stop her. “We’re not considered threats in his opinion, we’ve been too humanized by our adopted parents. Michael was on the radar for a little while after high school, but-” Isobel gestured toward the kitchen where Alex’s voice was barely audible. “True love mellowed him out, neutered him so to speak.”

“Isobel, that’s- you’re taking that out of context,” Jim protested, as he rubbed his eyes tiredly, brushing off the concern from Kyle. “When you kids were found, of course I knew what you were, but I never said anything to the Project. You were all so frightened, but trusting. I thought, violence is learned in a lot of ways. So Michelle and I did our best to find you good homes-”

“Seriously? Fucking nature versus nurture shit?” Michael took a deep breath trying to push down the sudden rage. “Your principles suck man, you let me, the fucked up and agitated one, the one who was scribbling on the walls, rot in the foster care system. I was considered too much work to be adoptable, so you’re real lucky I’m not a serial killer after what you humans put me through.” Abruptly he realized that Alex was at his side again, a comforting strength to lean on as he quietly took Michael’s clenched fist in his hand to hold. Unraveling the old pain of Michael’s past with his touch, before Alex threaded his fingers in with his as a silent promise. He wasn’t alone. 

It was Jim’s turn to frown, “Michael, you weren’t the one considered unadoptable at the group home.” His dark eyes flickered toward his protégé and then back to Michael. Max pushed himself away from the wall, his arms uncrossing slowly as the meaning sank in.

“It’s true, I saw it in his mind,” Isobel smiled sadly. “Max was the wild one, but you took the crayon from him, Michael. You took the blame.”

“Ann and Dave are good people, I knew that they could handle Max, raise him with love and understanding, and they did.” Jim straightened, his shoulders firming in resolve and meeting Max’s wounded expression, “You’re a good man, Max. I’ve watched you grow up and become a fine police officer, honorable to the core. You may not like what I did, but I stand by it.”

“Right,” Max spat out with a thick voice, “I’ve been blaming myself, my whole life for leaving Michael behind, feeling guilty that I got the family, that I got the sister, and you’re telling me that I was right to feel that way? That it was my fault he was tortured by addicts and fundamentalist freaks?”

Michael looked away, his face heating slightly with Max broadcasting his past. It was one thing for Michael to speak about it, but Max? The familiar irritation of past fights flared up, sparked as always by his brother wanting to martyr himself over the events of Michael’s life. Those old feelings stirred with the new information. Max was the one who smelled like trouble? Max was the troubled child? Wounds that still bled slowly inside, were raked rawly anew. Alex nudged his shoulder gently, letting him soak up his strength. The time to deal with his history with Max at the group home was after they rescued the survivors.

“We can debate our fucked up family dynamics later, the important issue is there’s a prison full of our people being held by the military, and we need to figure out how to save them.” The focus of the group returned to Jim Valenti, as Michael stepped closer to the sheriff only to stop when Alex tightened his hand on his arm. 

“Um, before we move off of the subject of fucked up family dynamics, why did you decide to kill my dad now after all these years? He’s been a monster from day one, which you knew, so I’m just curious about the timing.”

The Sheriff shifted in the chair at Alex’s pointed question, as Kyle leaned forward with interest. The act of vigilante justice was out of character but why now indeed, Michael considered. Over the years, especially when Alex was showing up at school with long-sleeves and a black eye, there must have been plenty of motivation to take care of Jesse Manes by Jim. Once again, it was Isobel who spoke up, “He got tired of being blackmailed by your dad, Alex.”

“Blackmail?” Kyle echoed.

This time, Jim beat Isobel to the disclosure, getting up to approach his son directly. “You know I’m not a perfect man, that I made mistakes in the past, and Jesse knew-”

“I know you cheated on Mom, okay?”

“What you don’t know is there was a child-”

“Wait, you have another kid? I have a sibling?”

“You _had_ a sibling. Yes. She was murdered in 2008 by an alien.”

Michael bit his cheek deeply, not daring to look at Max as the penny dropped for him during the tense exchange between Jim and Kyle Valenti. The source of Jesse Manes’s hold on Jim Valenti was Rosa Ortecho. The fiery car wreck they had staged that night hadn’t hidden anything after all. Jim and Jesse Manes had known that Rosa had been killed by one of them. His shoulders drew tightly together, that despite Isobel’s assurances from the mind space, perhaps they weren’t safe? Jim Valenti knew that his daughter had been murdered, that can’t inspire sympathy. 

On the other side, the revelation that he had a dead sister had rocked Kyle into silence. The next revelation of whom that sister was, hung above all of them like a waiting guillotine. Michael’s thoughts drifted toward Liz, if she had known that her high school boyfriend and her older sister had shared a father. That was drama on the level of a morning talk show that sported thrown chairs and DNA test revelations. 

“Holy shit,” Jenna blurted out, having made the connection of whom he meant and then covered her mouth in chagrin. “Sorry boss!”

Kyle was still standing there, stalled in front of his dad. Michael had never seen that brilliant mind grind to a halt before, there was always a spark of compassion, a jolt of forward momentum to problem-solve, going on in the background of the doctor. Now, it was nothing but incomprehension. He had a sister and she was dead. 

“Rosa Ortecho. It wasn’t drugs or alcohol or a car accident that killed her,” Jim began, dropping the reveal finally. He rushed to reassure Kyle, as the blood abruptly drained from his face and horror took over, “Just Rosa. Arturo is Liz’s dad, I swear.”

“But with Liz’s mom? That’s who you’ve been cheating with?” Kyle now seemed to be torn between wanting to know more and hating every word he learned from his dad. He held up his hand in response, “Putting aside how fucked up it was for you to stay silent about Rosa being my sister while I was dating _her_ sister Liz, how could you do this? Not just to Mom, but Arturo Ortecho is probably one of the kindest men I have ever met-”

“That is sometimes the attraction, son, when you live with saints. Helena and I, we are devils when you compare us to the likes of your mom and Arturo. So I’m not going to make excuses-”

“Good, because I don’t want them. I can barely look at you right now.” 

“None of us,” Michael spoke up to cut the tension between father and son, “have the ability to change to the past. What we can do now is try to be better. Tell me about Caulfield. Tell us how we can shut that down, then you guys can go back to the Jerry Springer surprise sibling show.” 

Kyle rolled his eyes at Michael’s quip but backed away from his father with a nod. The subject was clearly not closed between Kyle and his dad, but the reminder of just what was going on 100 miles north shifted the mood in the room. Both Max and Isobel visibly relaxed as they moved off the topic of Rosa Ortecho and back to the most immediate problem of rescuing the survivors. Michael tucked that old discomfort about Isobel away, what she still didn’t know about the night Rosa and the girls were murdered. She had thankfully stopped watching him with worried paranoia the few times she had caught him drunk and mourning the loss of his relationship with Alex.

“I never liked it, even though it was a family obligation from the time of the crash. Your abuelo made it clear to me that there was no backing away from it, not after our el tatarabuelo Hector was murdered,” Jim spoke slowly, his eye flickering from Max’s stone face and then back to his son. “That’s why I told you, Kyle-”

“You didn’t exactly volunteer this information, I had to follow you-”

“Yes, you are your mother’s son. But I was going to tell you, especially after Jesse died. I needed you to be aware that Flint Manes might retaliate.” Now, Jim looked at Alex, with an acerbic half-smile, “You did well getting out of this town, staying out of Jesse’s reach.”

“If you say so, but maybe if he had brought me into this secret sooner, we could have stopped it together.” Alex shrugged, “Dad, in his right mind, wrote me off long ago for disobeying his orders about enlisting. I can tell he’s ruined at least one of my brothers in the meantime, maybe more of them. Still, you’re not wrong to be worried about Flint, he’s obsessed with legacy and living up to Dad’s memory.”

“And did you have to kill Jesse Manes? Couldn’t you have just arrested him for something, like blackmail?” Kyle cut in, gesturing toward the uniform his dad still wore. “I'm an adult now, Rosa has been dead for almost seven years now. What’s the worst he could do, sponsor another candidate for sheriff?”

It was a fair question. Michael wasn’t sure if the court of law would recognize Jesse’s actions in maintaining Caulfield as a criminal act, not with the apparent sanction of military involvement. He wasn’t sure what the statute of limitations were for child abuse. 

“Oh!” Isobel exclaimed, causing the sheriff to look away, his face looking older just from the discussion. “He still hopes he can bring her back. Rosa. Oh my god, seriously? You have her in a pod?”

That was news to all of them, as Max straightened with alarm, shooting a fast look at Michael. 

“There’s… there’s talk of an alien, they call him the Savior. Back in 1947, after the crash, after most of the survivors had been-” Jim stopped, clearly looking for a more diplomatic word before finally settling on, “been _detained_. Jesse, for whatever it’s worth, was useful in looking for him, so maybe I could have my Rosa back. But it’s been so long, that savior is probably long dead. And I got tired of Jesse’s manipulation, not to mention, he was moving toward weapons development. I’ve got a lot of blood on my hands, I’ve done a lot of bad things, Kyle, but I’ve never supported genocide.”

“Admirable, genocide is your line but mass incarceration wasn’t. Good to know,” Kyle scoffed, before turning his back on his dad, “let’s focus. Like Michael said, it’s time to shut that place down. If you want forgiveness, you’ll tell me how we can do it.”

With that line drawn so firmly in the sand, Jim shed the last secrets he held and spoke.

*** 

Michael stalked away from Alex angrily, and headed out to the perfectly curated garden attached to the rental house. Ornamental bushes, a bird feeder and a gorgeous fake dry riverbed snaked through the background in an attempt to provide a low maintenance backyard without compromising on the aesthetics. As beautifully sculpted as the environment was, it did little to soothe the immediate anger rushing in Michael’s veins. 

Serenity was far away, almost in another galaxy for him.

Alex felt like he was the perfect candidate to assume his brother’s identity to the Caulfield Prison after Jim had revealed he had an ID badge and uniform for the ruse. No matter how viciously Michael had protested the idea of a Nashville musician going undercover as a hardened soldier, Alex had remained resolute in his desire to make things right and attempt to undo the harm his family had inflicted. It wasn’t his burden to bear but Alex stubbornly refused to see that.

Michael scooped up a small decorative rock and threw it as hard as he could, out into the flat barren desert, stretching just beyond the property line. 

“Was that with or without your alien brain power?” Kyle asked, sitting up from the small patio table where he was partially obscured from view.

“Without,” Michael bit out. 

“Cool.”

He stared into the distance, focusing his eyes on the tiny spec of a bird winging over the scrub grass until his eyes started to burn with the effort. Kyle stayed blessfully silent, as Michael rubbed the moisture away with his left hand, the scar tissue stretching over the old broken fingers, rough against his face.

There was a comfort there between them, forged over the nights where they both carefully didn’t probe past the surface subjects and simply used the physical touch as their language of communication. Michael kept his back to Kyle for a while, taking long deep breaths to push down the last vestiges of wild anger. He had lost the habit of this during the last few years, feeling helpless and paralyzed with fear over something happening to Alex; the last time was sitting in the back of the Wild Pony watching while Alex had dodged raucous drunks from the air base as he served drinks and bused the tables. Or those nights when Alex had walked home alone from the bus stop before Michael was finally able to get that Frankenstein Ford up and running for safer transportation.

There was a crunch of gravel, and then in his peripheral vision, Michael watched as Kyle bent down to pick up a rock. He hefted the rock once, and then stepped back, like he was still that high school quarterback moving out of the pocket, and threw it. The rock took a slow flight and made a weak drop just a few feet away. Kyle looked at his hand first in betrayed confusion, and then over to where the rock landed close by.

Michael gave a slow clap in response, trying to keep from smiling too smugly as he briefly forgot the turmoil of his fight with Alex. “Wow that takes me back to Homecoming senior year, we were down by 3 against Goddard High-”

“And I threw that squib pass on 4th and 4 and lost the game,” Kyle finished, before shaking his wonderingly. “Oh my god, that was you, wasn’t it? You used your alien power, so I would lose that game.” He bumped his shoulder against Michael’s amiably. It said something about Kyle’s character that wasn’t angry with this reveal, just darkly amused, having left high school behind him. “Wow. What did I do to Alex Manes to deserve that humiliation? Wait, don’t remind me, no doubt whatever it was, I deserved that treatment.”

“Nah, I wasn’t on Alex’s radar during Homecoming.” Michael had been too busy studying and applying for scholarships, to lift his head from his books occasionally. Except for when Max had pouted loudly for company in his ‘be wherever Liz was’ strategy for winning her heart. “No, this was because you were dating Liz Ortecho and my brother Max was head-over-heels in love with her. I was trying to do him a solid.”

“Loyal, aren’t you, I’ve always liked that about you,” Kyle commented quietly, looking out toward the setting sun on the horizon. Pink, purple and streaks of yellow stained the sky before them. Lights were starting to go on in the house as the shadows crept in. At some point, a plan of action would need to be agreed upon by everyone, but for now, this was the calm before the storm. And as the cicadas were just starting their song in the quiet, Kyle turned to face Michael. His handsome face blank of expression, “Dad said that Rosa was murdered by an alien. That wasn’t you, was it?”

Fear always lapped against the shores, it was present from the moment Michael had realized he was different from other children as a foundling, separated from Max and Isobel. Sometimes it roared through him with a powerful wake, crashing over to rob him of sight and sound. Sometimes it was just a quiet presence, like the place where the sky met the horizon, there every morning as the sun rose. A fact with no fanfare. 

Kyle had taken the news about alien life, and Michael in particular pretty well on reflection, it was his father’s association that had brought on his attempt at alcohol poisoning. The burden of Rosa’s and the other girls’ deaths was one Michael had carried for Isobel, to protect her, and it had cost him a future at university and later Alex. At least, he amended, he had lost Alex for only a little while, although he wasn’t prepared to trust that Nashville’s hold on him would stay broken forever. 

Was he ready to lose this friendship, unforeseen but now strangely essential to Michael if he parroted the lie he’d been telling since that night in 2008? He didn’t know how to betray Isobel either, on the off chance he had misjudged Kyle’s goodwill. 

The pause lasted too long. Kyle huffed out a sigh and turned away, causing Michael to reach out and grab his wrist to halt the retreat, “Wait-”

“You don’t have to tell me anything, Guerin, it’s fine. I’m certainly not going to throw stones, since I know what my dad is capable of now.” Then Kyle studied Michael’s face, and a slight, disbelieving smile spread at what he found there, “Wow, you really care what I think.”

With a brief look back toward the house, Michael rubbed the back of his head awkwardly as he explained, “Listen, high school me would have never believed it either, but yeah. I care about what you think of me. And just because things have changed between us, doesn’t mean I don’t care about you too.”

“I wasn’t sure, you’ve always played your cards close to the vest. I mean, not going to lie, the emotionally unavailable ‘I’m still hung up on my ex’; it’s written in neon light all over you, but-” Kyle broke off in a laugh. “I clearly didn’t care, and to be honest, that was sort of the charm of this when we first got started. Being an overworked resident, it’s not like I had the energy for more, and you were really great about not wanting more than I had to give. Then I dunno, I’m not really sure when that changed.” 

“I’m sorry-”

“Don’t be, I’m a big boy, I’ll be fine but,” He paused again and his dark eyes, burning with sincerity but also unfathomable kindness, held a passing familiarity to Michael. It was an out-of-body experience to suddenly realize just why Kyle had been attractive to him in the first place. A good set of hands was just the start apparently. “My dad made it sound like that you three were the only aliens living free, and I know it wasn’t _you_ , okay? If you could tell me about what happened to Rosa, would you?”

“Yes.” Michael looked down at where he was still holding Kyle’s wrist in his grip, before shifting to cover his hand completely and squeezed it between within his mismatched grip of his. “You really believe it wasn’t me? Why?” He couldn’t help his curiosity, even though he knew he should probably move off of the subject to protect Isobel. The benefit of doubt felt good, because for all that Kyle had known, Michael had led a life just on the edges of respectability as a mechanic. That didn’t even take into account the long-term harm Jesse’s smear campaign had had on Michael’s name around Roswell.

Kyle reached up with his thumb and pressed it against Michael’s cheek with a slow drag against the grain of stubble, “Because that’s not the face of a killer.”

Suddenly the back door to the house swung open, with Alex standing there. His face went on an impressive journey of surprise, then focused intent on where Kyle was still touching Michael’s face, and finally an unreadable expression as his eyes drifted down to where Michael was still holding Kyle’s hand. That was enough for Michael to drop his hands away, with a burn of discomfort. “Sorry to interrupt,” Alex did not sound sorry at all as he interjected, “but your dad has some news about movement at the prison. We might need to put the plan into play sooner, rather than later.”

He didn’t wait for Michael or Kyle to respond as he disappeared back into the house, the door slamming closed on a note of finality.

“I gotta say, ‘Billboard Magazine’s top ten new songwriters to watch’ being jealous of me is good for the ego,” Kyle joked lightly. “Also, I kinda thought he was smarter than that, I mean you did tell him the score here-.”

Michael rolled his eyes, before turning back to the sunset. This was his favorite part of the afternoon, where the streaks of pink settled into a deep royal purple as the moon rose in the background. Where the light felt soft and forgiving, and the night was ready to cover him in a dark cloak of safety. 

“He knows. Now whether he wants to listen to me, is a whole `nother thing.” The reminder of the heated discussion that had sent him outside in the first place reignited inside him. “We’re batting a thousand on that today because apparently publishing a few songs and getting an album green-lit means you’re also qualified to go undercover in a military-run prison. He’s an idiot. Of course, I want my people rescued, but if it means something happens to him, it’s just not worth it to me, and he doesn’t seem to get it.”

“I can see that. He’s definitely an idiot.” Kyle held up his hands harmlessly after Michael turned to shoot him with a lethal look at the perceived insult toward Alex, “Like I said, the whole ‘not over your ex’ was visible from orbit. And you know, it was always a little weird to me that you were still so hung up on him after he left for Nashville and became what passes for famous in Roswell. You never really moved on, did you?”

“Can’t move on,” Michael returned his gaze to the skyline, wondering if his questions would soon be explained to him. What made Alex special? Other than the obvious his mind reminded him, but still he was aware from others, humans, that he was not normal in how nothing made sense to him without Alex there. The stars started to brighten in the violet sky, pin-pricking through the dark on a path of fusion and refraction, as always, providing more questions than answers to Michael. Soon that could change. “Apparently with my people, after we fall, we fall for good.” 

“Does he know that?”

“No.”

“Don’t you think you should tell him?”

The answer to that was obviously yes, but Michael was still holding back. Kyle had rightly called him out on holding his cards close to the vest, because as declarative as Alex was about taking this needed break from music, it was still just that, a break. Instead of answering directly, Michael finally turned away from the skyline to face Kyle. “So, I know I don’t really have a room to ask you for any favors, but maybe if you can see if you can convince your dad to keep Alex out of this plan? Trade on that guilt your dad has about the whole lyin’ and cheatin’ on your mom. I would owe you for life, for _my_ life.”

Kyle pressed his lips together, clearly torn by the idea of using his father’s sins for any kind of favor but in the end, he was a healer first. He nodded in slow agreement. 

***

The movement that Jim Valenti had been alerted to was the worst case scenario. The prisoners, after their initial transition from a military base to a prison over 60 years ago, were now on the move in the wake of Jesse Manes’s death. The window of influence by a legacy member of Project Shepherd was closing rapidly as custody shifted back to complete control by the government. “US government can hide people in rendition holes that no one can find, what do you think they’re gonna do with aliens? We gotta go now,” Jim had urged them.

The defenses of the Caulfield prison were uniquely constructed to make it extremely dangerous for anyone but a human to enter. Despite their desires otherwise, Jim had explained patiently that the best chance for success was to have Kyle with him as a protégé being groomed to take over, Jenna Cameron with her connection in silencing alien crimes, and finally Alex, impersonating his brother Flint Manes. 

After another pointless whispered argument, Michael had folded reluctantly that night and let Alex go with the next morning with a fierce hungry kiss. “Come back to me,” he had pressed into Alex’s shoulder, clothed in an unfamiliar and jarring camouflage pattern. His quiet words had been a command, not a request, as he had clung tightly to Alex before forcing himself to release him, finger by finger. His broken hand had been the last to drop away from Alex, his frozen fingers were stubborn in responding to the instruction of ‘let go’. “No heroics, just come back here safe.”

Alex had, in the end, given him a fake salute in the borrowed military uniform with Flint Manes’s ID clipped sharply to his pocket. “I’ll be back before you have a chance to miss me.”

And so, Michael was left in the impersonal rental house that next morning, with only the company of Max. Isobel had returned home the previous night, unwilling to risk alerting Noah to anything out of the ordinary until it was clear that other survivors from their planet could be rescued. She had smirked tiredly, after nearly everyone had filed out for the night. “If I’m going to blow up my life with my human husband who I’ve been lying to since we met, I want it to be worth it.”

There had been less than five hours before Jim Valenti was due to pick Alex up for the trip north and Michael had spent every second of it in bed with Alex that night. Reminding him of all the reasons there were to stay safe with his lips, his body and cock. It had been a struggle between fighting a normal instinct to protect someone he loved and fighting the cell-deep scream of alarm that his body gave off as Alex left his sight. Four years ago, while watching him board an airplane to Nashville, Michael had needed two bottles of acetone to leave the concourse and a handkerchief to mop the bloody half-moon crescents his fingernails had left in the meat of his right palm. 

And that was just what watching Alex disappear into a better, safer life in Tennessee had done to him. Watching him leave for certain danger this time was decidedly different. At least Max understood it, and had brought another bottle of one hundred dollar tequila to share as they waited for news.

“Cam is an experienced ex-Army specialist, she’ll keep an eye on Alex.” Max poured a shot out, despite the early morning hour, and drained it quickly before serving Michael. “I’m here though, to establish an alibi for you if you want to jump in a car and follow them. We can pretend you hit me over the head over my objections.”

Michael briefly smiled at the joke, knowing that his brother wasn’t serious. Between what Jim had explained, Michael’s presence would only trigger more danger for everyone involved including the surviving prisoners, and since there was no dissuading Alex from going to Caulfield, he was staying in place. As promised.

“But don’t worry, though. Cam is the best, and she’ll probably also keep Kyle out of trouble, if you’re worried about him too.”

Michael stayed silent, the nerves never settling despite his brother’s comforting prattle. He cupped his hands around the shot glass, his left hand gripping weakly, as he reminded himself again that Alex would be fine without Michael there to protect him.

“How’s that going?”

“How’s what going,” he answered dully.

“Talk to me dude,” Max entreated, reaching out to nudge Michael’s leg with his booted toe. “We’ve got nothing but time to kill. Tell me what’s up, since I couldn’t help but notice that you went radio silent the minute Alex Manes rolled back into town.” He cocked an eyebrow at Michael, full of mischief and teasing, “So are you in the middle of some love triangle now between Valenti and Alex?”

Barking out a laugh, Michael could appreciate what Max was trying to do here in efforts to distract him. “No, no, I don’t do love triangles, man.” For a wild and really hot moment he pictured having both of them at once, two sets of clever hands and dark eyes but then decided that even though biologically he required less sleep than a human, even he had his limits. “Besides, I’ve pretty much been wired for just Alex Manes since high school, from where I sit, nothin’ has changed. It’s just him, he screws me up, but then he also puts me back together too. And Kyle gets it. I mean, he says I’m not subtle, so-” Michael finished with a wry shrug before picking up the drink to down it. 

Despite the bottle on the table, he had limited himself to a single drink. The risk of being incapacitated in the case of trouble was too great to continue. Michael had resigned himself to anxiously bouncing his leg, or watching the screen of his phone for a message, not drowning his nerves in smooth tequila.

“Do you ever wonder if you would be like this if things had been different?”

“You mean if he had stayed and never left for Nashville?”

Max smiled thinly, tapping his finger against his lips. “No, I mean, if Alex had left after high school. Like Liz did. Would you still be on the verge of spazzing out if he was doing something dangerous?”

On some level Michael knew that the recent talk about Rosa Ortecho would have had Liz back in his brother’s mind again. He could tell Max was thinking about high school again, taking those last memories of senior year out to run through his thoughts again. Seven years later, Max had found recent companionship with Jenna, the worst kept secret of the Chaves County Sheriff’s Office, but still his compass was ultimately fixed on Liz. At least Jenna knew that Max was an alien, whether he had shared some of his more unique species-specific characteristics, Michael did not know.

“If Alex had left, joined up like his dickhead dad wanted, and I had to sit here in Roswell, not knowing if he was getting shot at or if he was even still alive, I’m pretty sure ‘spazzing out’ would be the least of it. At least in Nashville, I was just torturing myself by picturing him getting laid by hot bass players.” Michael closed his eyes, reminded all over again that while Alex was still as tough as nails, he wasn’t a soldier. Enemy infiltration wasn’t a part of that life he had in Tennessee. Damn it. It was a really good life.

Back in Roswell for less than a month, already Alex was getting dragged down by Michael’s bullshit. The same way he had when he had stayed, giving Jesse the finger, earning minimum wage jobs and barely hidden harassment from the rest of the town. At least this time, Jesse was finally dead, and his celebrity would protect him from the bigots. The albatross of the Manes name was still there, heavy now not with the weight of expectation, but the weight of the evil done to Michael’s people. Michael wished more than ever he could lift it from Alex.

“And how long is he staying?”

“For a few months he says, before he has to go back. We haven’t really talked about it, I know he leased his house out for a while.” Michael firmed up his shoulders, “And whether I go back with him depends on what they find at Caulfield, if they can rescue some of our people. I’ve wanted answers all my life, about where we come from, who our families are, and- I’ve lived without Alex before.”

“Barely, if you call it living,” Max commented dismissively, though he was speaking more for himself. 

“Well since we’re talking livin’ now, what are we going to do about Jim Valenti and Rosa? Isobel had a good look at his mind, so he knows what she can do. But you and I are a mystery for him, and sooner or later he’s going to guess about us. About what we can do.” Michael wiggled his right hand, “You going to let him in on the whole savior thing? That you can heal, or are we gonna keep it simple, you explode light bulbs when you get mad or get a stiffy in your pants.”

Max shot an unamused look at his language but poured another shot. “Do you think it’s possible?”

He knew instantly what Max was asking. It wasn’t like Michael’s thoughts hadn’t gone down that same path once he learned that Jim believed so strongly he stole his daughter’s corpse. “Max, you tried that night, remember? You couldn’t bring her back then, what’s changed in seven years?”

“Yeah well, none of us really know what we’re doing with our powers. Maybe if Valenti brings back someone, rescues like, my dad? What if it is hereditary what I can do?” Max grew more animated, leaning forward with a renewed spark in his eyes. “If I could bring back Rosa-”

“And then Liz would come home, fall in love with you, you’d get married, and she’d make five babies with you,” Michael finished, but not unkindly despite the subject. “And how do we explain that to the town? How do we explain that to her family, fuck, what happens to Isobel if you _are_ able to do this, to bring Rosa back to life, and she says it wasn’t me that killed her?”

“The military already knows-” Max exploded verbally while the lights, with brand-new bulbs flickered in a mild protest. He stopped and took a deep breath, visibly reaching for control. “You’re right about Isobel, we’d have to figure something out there, make sure she never finds out.”

“Or we could tell her.”

“C’mon man, we swore we wouldn’t!”

“We were seventeen then, Max! It’s different now, she’s not some insecure teenage girl anymore. She’s solid. She has a great job, she has a husband who worships her and she knows you and I aren’t going anywhere-” Michael ignored Max’s muttered ‘maybe not _you_ ’ and kept talking as he warmed to the subject, “Maybe it’s time we tell her. ‘Cause she’s got a good support system now.”

For a long moment Max just stared at him, his lips pulled together in a mulish pout. “This is about Alex, isn’t it? You want to explain everything to him, not just the alien thing. Listen, no one made you take the fall for her, Michael, you did that on your own without talkin’ to me about it. I’m sorry that it had consequences on your life, hell I guess it’s fucking up both of your love lives-”

“You’re a goddamn prick,” Michael observed wonderingly, and as he eyed his empty shot glass. His phone was frustratingly silent with no news from Alex, and so the bottle stayed out of his reach. “It’s not about Alex, this is about the fact we’ve both lied to her, and you don’t know if she’s going to forgive us for it.”

“I love my sister, okay? I have supported her all her life, but you’re right, she’s in a good position now. She has Noah, she could easily cut us both out of her life for this.” Max dropped his voice and his antagonism, as he drifted back into the quiet sadness that had followed him since his senior year of high school. “And before you say she wouldn’t, you weren’t raised by Ann Evans. I love my mom, but she’s a real ‘dead to me’ person when it comes to grudges. That sort of thing rubs off on you in ways you don’t realize until you’re an adult.”

There was nothing Michael could say to that. He wasn’t raised by Ann Evans, he wasn’t raised by anyone in particular, not even the man who gave him ‘Guerin’ as his last name on the paperwork. He named his parents by the lessons he had learned, from how to survive general neglect, to stretching meals with food insecurity, then there was the outright terror after the exorcism with his arm on fire, and finally that cold hatred he learned from that last hands-on foster dad. 

So no, he wasn’t raised by Ann Evans. He wasn’t raised by anyone but that school of hard knocks. Silently he prayed, his eyes focused steadily on his phone, that it wasn’t too greedy of him to hope that he might have both Alex and a surviving member of his people in his life in the future. 


	8. This Hard Heart (2/2)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The conclusion of This Hard Heart

Michael had received an anonymous text message on his phone just as the sky started to blend from afternoon golds into the late evening lavender blues of dusk. **“All landed safely. Take off had fewer passengers than expected. ETA should be dinner time.”**

It appeared his favorite Nashville musician had watched too many spy movies, Michael decided with a ghost of humor, as he worked his way through the translation of Alex’s message. ‘Fewer passengers’ sent his stomach southward, but he knew from Jim Valenti’s sober explanation of the prison, that the original almost 400 hundred survivors from the 1947 crash had dwindled over the years to a depressing 75. 

After trading barbs with Max over telling Isobel the truth, thankfully the subject had moved to lighter topics until finally they whiled away the rest of the hours watching the History Channel, where Max lectured to him about the dramatization drift from facts, uncaring of whether Michael was paying attention or not. The text revived the unease inside about what was going on over a hundred miles north of them, though he hoped that because Alex had sent the message, he was at least unharmed.

The next argument that erupted between them was over the definition of what was considered dinner time, at which Michael threw up his hands and walked outside of Alex’s rental house with a folding chair and a bottle of water around 4 pm to wait. It didn’t take long for Max to follow him out, and take up a seat next to him silently. Isobel was on her way over, having left a note for her husband Noah about a last minute yoga class appointment. 

So then there were three, waiting patiently outside of the rental house for Jim Valenti to return with survivors in tow. It had started with three, it was fitting that it would end that way. 

Headlights flashed in the background, until the dark retreated to reveal the white and brown body of the Chaves County cruiser heading down the long winding driveway, finally coming to a stop in front of the house. Michael was instantly out of the chair, rushing toward the car as the doors opened all around. From the front of the sedan emerged both Jim and Jenna, still in their law enforcement uniforms, Jenna in particular looked tense and with a pall over her face. The one person Michael was waiting for, was the last to arise from the back of the police car. Still wearing that hateful military uniform, Alex’s head was viewable first as he gingerly stepped free of the backseat. 

Alex met his gaze with a smile that missed his eyes, and before Michael could round the car to take him into his arms, Alex bent down to offer a hand to someone hidden in the car. Abruptly Michael was reminded of the message that he received earlier, that there were fewer passengers than expected, but still there were ‘passengers’. Survivors. 

Michael saw the bald head first, but as soon as he met her eyes, a wave of recognition rocked him. His knees gave out without warning, causing Max to jump to grab his arm to hold him upright. Even with his brother’s steadying hold, Michael sank lower to the ground as the elderly woman moved toward him, until the concrete driveway bit into his knees painfully. From one breath to the next, he broke. Tears brimmed, pushed and then spilled down his face as the chaos in mind vibrated to a single frequency. He knew her. Oh god, he _knew_ her. 

“Michael!” Both Max and Isobel chorused in shock on either side of him as he stayed on his knees before the slow, careful movements of the old woman, who stopped just in front of him.

His entire world narrowed to the tired blue eyes before him. Her frail hands reached for his, pausing only for a moment as her fingers linked with his, one whole, one twisted by Jesse Manes. Then. Then there was a soft timid knock on his thoughts, like someone unsure that they were at the right address, before all of Michael’s defenses collapsed, mismatched and armored from a lifetime of struggles, but falling neatly away at the knowledge.

_Nora. Mom._

A wild, anguished cry was pulled from Michael’s throat as he fell forward into her, pulling away from his siblings to clutch at her deceptively strong hands. His mom. He found his mom. Her thoughts washed over his, full of the same overwhelmed joy of reconnection. The open wounds of the past, papered over imperfectly when he rejoined Isobel and Max in Roswell at 11, when he met Alex at 17, finally closed and healed under the adoration laved on his heart by her hands and her mind.

Michael didn’t know how much time had passed as they held each other before he became aware of the background conversation, Max’s voice heartbreaking and hopeful, “Are there others? How many?”

“Flint had moved most of them off-site. There were only four left, we were able to rescue three,” that was Jenna’s voice. “One died at the prison. Unavoidable.”

“Kyle took the other two survivors to our family hunting cabin, it’s remote but secure-”

“Then why are we still standing here? Maybe our mom’s there- Isobel spoke up, reed sharp with impatience. 

“ _Your_ mother, Isobel, is on the reservation. Or was.”

Michael pulled away at his mother’s voice, rusty with disuse but soft, to look up at her face, streaked with tears. “What? What reservation?”

Nora reached out with her hand to brush away the stubborn curl that shadowed his right eye, Michael tilted toward her touch. Locking eyes on one another, she smiled at him, licking her thumb to smooth away a strand of hair. Then with a thin voice, she answered, “Louise, your Isobel’s mother, she survived and lived free here. I was the last captured after the crash. My friend,” and then she turned to where Alex was, bent down near the police cruiser fiddling with his borrowed uniform pant leg, “my friend Tripp, your _inamorato’s_ ancestor, tried to rescue us both. He was only able to save Louise, hiding her within the Navajo people. He came back for me, but died trying to breach my cell.” Nora kept her hands on some part of Michael as she spoke, touching his arm, his shoulder, his cheekbone, whisper-light as if to reassure herself he was real. “I have a few answers for Isobel, and no answers for Max.” 

_You’ve grown up so well my son, so strong. I knew you would, your heart is so big, so bright. You’ve brought light to the Dark One._

Before Michael could voice his question, about whom the Dark One was — (Was it Isobel? Did they know about what she could do even when she was a child?), the sound of an expensive engine roaring up the drive caught everyone’s attention as they all stood frozen in front of the rental house. Jim moved first at the motion, drawing his service weapon out of his holster as Jenna moved quickly toward Nora to protect her and Alex moved similarly to stand in front of him. Michael had to swallow the small noise as Alex’s hand pressed hard against his chest to keep him from moving around him. “Now’s not the time to dance, darlin’-” Michael protested.

“Wait, don’t shoot, that’s my husband!” Isobel cried, waving her hands downward as the expensive silver Range Rover parked recklessly next to Alex’s Mercedes. “It’s Noah! It’s okay!”

Except even as she assured them that Noah was a friendly visitor, Nora straightened with alarm as the door swung open. She helped Alex pull Michael behind him, revealing more strength in her arms than anyone imagined she had by the look of her weakened state. Nora spoke quietly to Alex, “He is dangerous.”

Immaculately dressed in a dove gray suit, Noah stepped free from the car wearing an expression of worried but benign alarm that dropped quickly as he caught sight of Nora’s diminutive but rigid figure. “You!”

“Me,” she agreed grimly.

Isobel, lost and confused by the confrontation, rushed toward Noah, “Honey! What- what are you doing here? How did you find me-”

“There’s no yoga classes after 5 pm on Wednesday. Marisol who runs the studio goes to an early evening mass.” Noah’s gaze never left Nora’s as he spoke to Isobel, “Your mind brought me here.”

“My mind?!”

Instead of answering, Noah clutched at his temples in pain, ducking down and then shoved Isobel’s grasp away from him without touching her. Michael started to bolt toward her, except his feet felt frozen, as if a force of telekinesis had stopped him in his tracks. Next to him, he was aware that Alex was similarly held in place. 

It was not possible.

Noah. Noah was one of them. Alien. The bookish well-dressed lawyer with his corny puns and his warm welcome of Michael to their home was not human. The man was completely unthreatened by their relationship, despite the fact Isobel had never defined it outside of Michael’s importance to her. He was holding them all still with his mind. Behind that sweet smile for his sister, was someone who had apparently all the answers this whole time for Michael. Goddammit. He had sat next to Noah on a couch, forcing himself to care about a sporting event, just to make Isobel happy, and he had liked it. Liked the easy male friendship that never dipped into heavy topics. Noah was just nice.

A nice alien who his mother, and fuck he was still not used to that, Nora recognized and hated on sight. Nora was clearly doing something to Noah, as he waved his hands at them all in defense with increasing desperation. As Noah staggered back to his car, Max moved toward him with the sparks of electricity crackling from his fingertips, the surprise of everything delaying his initial response as he realized that both of them were frozen in place by Noah, not that Michael was doing his best to protect Alex. Just before Max reached the car, the Range Rover roared to life, more telekinesis Michael noted as finally the hold broke, and Noah threw himself into the SUV to drive to retreat down the driveway just as fast as he drove up it.

As he peeled out down the driveway, Max asked the question everyone was thinking as he looked at Jim and Jenna then focusing on Nora, “Well what the hell was that?”

“That was a defector. He was- he was an _underdecker_. A hitchhiker to power, morally reprehensible, so much so that he reeks of stolen lives. Of death itself. What have you allowed him to do here?” Nora answered, before closing her eyes to sway with the onset of fatigue on her exertions. No one knew how long it had been since she had been able to use her abilities, it didn’t seem likely that the US Military would have allowed a prison populace to remain ‘armed’. As soon as she wavered on her feet, Michael moved to catch her while Alex rushed toward the rental house front door to open.

In the background he could hear Isobel and Max talking in agitated tones over just what did that mean, did she know that Noah was one of them, how could she not know, and then Jim’s low, deep voice seeking to calm them both but with a probing question of how well did Isobel know her husband. None of that really mattered to Michael at the moment as he lifted his mother into his arms. He had two dreams in front of him, one he had long given up, a child’s plaintive cry on a rough cattle fence outside of town, and the other, Alex. He still lacked the vocabulary to describe Alex, but maybe his mother could help. 

_His mother._ The words kept spinning around in his throat, a cyclone of rage at finding her now after so long and terror of how close he came to never finding her at all swirled with tremulous joy at this second chance. As Michael held her too-light body in his arms, he looked over at Alex who was holding the door open for them, expecting to find that same amazed relief in his eyes. 

There was longing there but there was something else more concerning. Even after their years of separation, he could still read that emotion in Alex’s face, fear. 

***

“You know how Madonna did singing _and_ acting?”

“What-”

“She had the talent for both in my opinion, but you don’t, so you should stick to just singing and tell me why you’re acting so strange.” 

Michael frowned as he paused outside of the kitchen at the sound of Jenna’s and Alex’s voices. Max had left with Isobel to follow Jim Valenti back to the house she shared with Noah, in hopes of finding out more answers about just how long Noah had lived this secret existence and locate him after his rapid departure. Jenna had volunteered to stay with Nora at the rental house on the off-chance Noah returned, and had made herself useful by combing through the house for security flaws.

He glanced back at the guest bedroom where his mother, _his mother,_ was resting after her first shower and meal outside of captivity in sixty-eight years and then back to the kitchen. The kitchen was an open air design, Michael knew the minute he stepped clear of the hallway he would be spotted. He hesitated to break cover because Jenna wasn’t wrong in her observation. Alex had been acting strangely ever since his return from Caulfield.

Perhaps this was Michael’s chance to learn just what was going on with him.

“I’m fine, don’t worry about it.”

“Nah, that doesn’t fly. Here’s what I know- I know that I shot an alien in the head that was trying to get to you. I know that it-or-he looked just like the one who did your dad in. I also know that Max cares about Guerin and Guerin is obsessed with you. So long story short, you are my concern now. So, I want to know what happened back at the prison.”

_My son, bring your heart-beloved to me._

Nora’s mind voice wrapped warmly around Michael’s anxious thoughts, her connection to him fit into the gaps he had never realized he had before now. He hesitated at the threshold, not wanting to interrupt Alex and Jenna, but then her mind nudged his gently, with a wave of reassurance in tow. His questions would be answered soon.

Michael rounded the corner, and immediately noticed Alex, now dressed in a soft long-sleeved shirt and sweatpants, turned away from Jenna to open the refrigerator door as soon as he caught sight of Michael. Subtle it wasn’t. He forced himself to smile and pretend he hadn’t heard anything of their prior discussion, “Hey Alex, can I borrow you for a second? My mom,” and here, Michael couldn’t help but smile broadly as he said the term ‘mom’ despite his worry, “my mom wants to talk to you.”

Slowly Alex closed the refrigerator door, straightening upright with the look of a man on his way to face a judge uncertain of his sentence. Was it as simple as Alex being worried about being liked by Michael’s parent? To be frank, it wasn’t something either of them had ever worried about in the past, since Michael had no fond memories of foster care and well, Jesse Manes. In the back of Michael’s mind, he knew there was an ex-Mrs. Manes that was still alive, but Alex never spoke of her but the once during that scary bout of pneumonia where the hospital had asked about next-of-kin, and he had replied, _“Mindy Manes, but only if I die, otherwise it’s Michael.”_ Perhaps he reasoned, Alex’s behavior was motivated by a sudden mother figure appearing.

“All right,” Alex brushed past Jenna without a sideways look at her to join Michael. “I mean, if she needs anything, she just has to ask, it’s hers, money is not an issue for me.”

Although the acknowledgement of money and the fact that Alex had so much of it now, still brushed peevishly on a raw part of Michael, like the feel of desert grit in his throat, he also knew there was no room for pride when it came to what Nora needed. He caught Alex’s shoulder with his hand just as he was about to enter the guest bedroom, “Thank you. For what you did, for what you’re doing now. Just, thank you.”

“Oh Michael, you don’t have to thank me,” Alex turned to face him, bringing his arms up to drape over Michael’s shoulder in a loose embrace. “This is literally the least I could do.”

“Well, do you think you might relax a bit?” Michael tipped his head forward, resting against Alex’s for a brief press before pressing a gentle kiss against his lips. “You don’t have to be so worried right now. I know there’s a lot to still figure out, but we’re safe, my mom is safe, let’s just appreciate the moment.”

“The moment,” Alex echoed softly. “Appreciate the moment.” Another unreadable expression crossed over his face before he moved to chase Michael’s lips for another kiss but this time it was nowhere in the neighborhood of gentle. His hands moved to clasp Michael’s face in his hands, tilting his chin in his hold to open his mouth wider to deepen the kiss. Michael shuddered under the possessive hold, his own hands dropping down to Alex’s waist as he felt the solid wall of the hallway hit his back. 

Distantly, he knew his mother was waiting for them, but higher thought slipped further away from Michael as Alex nipped at his lips before sliding their lips together. A low sound in his throat escaped as Alex pressed closer, the kiss growing in desperate fever. Every cell, every nerve crackled in lightning-sweet joy inside of him over the welcome of just having Alex. 

Reluctantly he broke the kiss, Michael’s breath coming in uneven gasps, “What was that for?” That kiss was borderline illegal from Alex, fully recognizable as the old prelude to more physical activities. He forced the rest of his body to relax, with the reminder that he did not want to face his mother with an erection. 

“Just thinking about how many times I have missed out on doing that over the last few years.” Alex smiled slowly, the dark lust-heavy blink was more welcome than the previous tension in his frame. The reprieve was brief, as his smile slipped into a sadness, with the frosted edge of sorrow bordering the corners of his mouth. “So much wasted time, just in general. We’re never going to get that time back. And I wish, I wish we could have found Nora sooner.”

“Me too, but can’t change the past,” Michael stroked his fingertips over the frown lines on Alex’s mouth before dropping his hand. “But the present feels pretty good right now.” Another brush of his mother’s mind, this time the impatience overtook the reassurance in her meaning. “Okay, my mom really wants to talk to you, so-” 

Alex took a deep breath, an old coping mechanism Michael hadn’t seen in a while, before turning the knob of the closed door to open it. Nora was propped up against stacks of lush, silk encased pillows in the bed, already looking healthier in just one day of freedom. Her face was slowly losing the gray pallor and her eyes sparkled with renewed hope as she took in Michael’s entrance with a small smile of welcome. She stretched both hands outward in welcome to them, “Come, both of you. There’s so much I wish to know.”

After a pause, Alex approached the bed with him, allowing Michael to take the right side of the bed, so he could hold his mother’s hand with a full grip with his whole and unmarred hand. Michael gave Alex a bright smile at the silent gesture and watched as he took his seat against the mattress gingerly. 

Her hand still open toward Alex, Nora spoke up, “I will not harm you, my touch is not poisonous. That is not a part of my abilities.” Her eyes moved toward Michael and then back to Alex as she continued in explanation, “Even if it were, you are my son’s other half, to harm you would be to harm him. I would embrace an inferno of death before I would allow that to happen.”

Michael watched as Alex took her hand, the renewed glow of wonder bubbled inside of him seeing them together. Questions, so many questions peppered his thoughts, and although he could feel the link between them, he used his voice to ask out loud, “My ability, did I get it from you? The fact I can move things with my mind?”

“Oh love, you have so much potential inside than just that, but yes. I, too, can move an object. My real talent is in encouraging the lesser order to grow into complexity.” She paused, noting the gap in translation on his face and clarified, “Food, the energy for plant growth, but not just that, the proteins that build our ships. Encouraging the higher orders, those with thoughts of their own, that sort of manipulation of cellular growth is beyond my talents.”

“You can’t heal like Max.”

“We can all take energy in, if we were depraved enough to do such a crime, but only a few can return that energy in the form of continued life.”

Alex cleared his throat quietly, “You said at the prison, that you knew my ancestor? My great-uncle Tripp?”

“Oh yes, my son’s mark is all over you, but I would have known you regardless.” Nora’s face, still lined with age and past suffering, flushed with a youthful joy at the subject change. “Tripp and I had a connection. We were…really just a possibility, because of his family. Still, he could have fallen in with those who feared without grounds, but instead, he fought that. He was kind, he was kind to me, but he still struggled, like you have struggled, Alex. I could see the good in him, the good that was possible in your bloodline, but not all of my people could. I’m sorry for what Jiayal has done to you.”

“What type of mark?-” 

“-wait, what was done to Alex-”

Michael and Alex spoke over each other, and guiltily, Michael pushed forward with his question mentally at Nora for answering. He already knew what his mother was about to reveal regarding the ‘mark’ to Alex. Absently he realized that Kyle was right once again, he probably should have said something sooner to Alex about just how love worked for him.

“You have not told him,” Nora replied instead, looking again at both of them with pursed lips of disapproval. Both of them were charged with the same crime apparently. She squeezed Michael’s fingers firmly to recapture his wandering attention toward Alex. “When the cell doors opened, there were just the four of us left awaiting transport. We were left for last because of the …danger? My guards were forbidden to make contact with me, they were worried I would bewitch them the way they thought Tripp had been. Wanyat and Verora were both skilled fire makers, and were weapons masters back home. Then finally there was Jiayal, the N-38 cell.”

His stomach sank as he looked away from his mother toward Alex for reassurance. N-38 was the cell number of the alien who had killed Jesse Manes with a single touch, triggering a life-ending brain tumor. ‘Done to you’ suddenly took on a whole new terrifying meaning to Michael. Instead of denial, Alex met his gaze with a sad wince, nodding in acknowledgement of the inference. 

“No! No! No!” This was not happening. Michael stuttered, mentally, physically, his world halted by the thought of losing Alex. As he fell into the downward spiral, an abyss he couldn’t rally himself to climb out of, his mother’s mind rolled over his, covering him in warmth and reassurance. 

“Oh my love, he’ll live, you haven’t lost him,” she said out loud, before turning toward Alex. “Jiayal only touched you briefly, right?”

“He grabbed my ankle, I kicked free of him, but then-” Alex confirmed grimly, before finishing, “then Deputy Cameron shot him. So you’re saying it won’t kill me? I’m not going to end up like- like drooling and brain-dead?”

“The instruction to your cells is localized to where the touch lands. Your, oh it was your father then, oh, he was held by the head. You were held by the foot. That is where the metastasis will take root.” Nora patted the mattress next to her, “I can confirm, if you place your foot here.”

After a moment of consideration, Alex shifted on the bed to bring his right foot up to the bedspread, with his bare and vulnerable looking toes. Nora moved her hand down his calf, lingering over the fine bone arch of his ankle before settling her grip over Alex’s foot. It only took a moment before she shook her head sadly. 

“The irregularity has already taken hold, I can feel the movement of the biological instruction under my fingertips. I believe you call it cancer?” Nora confirmed, stroking Alex’s foot with an apologetic squeeze of her hand before pulling away to face Michael’s worried expression. “When the doors opened, I thought I was still in the dreaming place with Louise, by the time I realized what was going on, the harm had already been done. He was past reasoning, driven mad over the years, when he harmed your _inamorato_ , my son. I am so sorry.”

“Max can heal people, let me just call him, and he can-”

“It does not work that way.” Her sorrowful pronouncement cut out Michael’s legs from beneath him, dashing his hope. “What our people can do, our abilities, were never meant to be in competition with one another. Perhaps if your beloved was dead, the Savior could bring him back with enough inertia, but otherwise, the cellular process has begun and there’s no end unless you cut out the signal.”

Alex released a short, bitter laugh as he slid off the bed to stand up. “I’ll be fine as long as we cut off my foot. That’s. That’s just great.”

“Alex-”

He paced toward the door and then turned sharply, holding up his hands. Michael fell silent at the look of piercing desperation. “Tell me how you knew I was close to Michael,” Alex demanded in an even tone as he faced Nora, still reclining on the bed with Michael’s hand in hers. “What did you mean that there was a mark on me?”

This time Nora stayed quiet, cutting her eyes toward Michael with another mental nudge to encourage him to explain himself to Alex. As if Michael could. As if he had any idea what it all meant. Wordlessly he sent his feelings back to her, showing her that Alex was essential to him, but he had no explanations about the why, the vocabulary to describe it had never been taught to him.

There was a click and hush as the air conditioner system kicked on, giving a soft background hum to the bedroom in the midst of the gradual tension building in the room, brick by brick of raw misunderstandings. Silently images and concepts flowed back and forth between mother and son within their mental communion. Outside of it, Alex barely hid his impatience as he looked at Nora and back to Michael again, waiting for a response. After four years in Nashville, little had been done to soften the sharp expectations of an answer that Alex had picked up from his military strict childhood.

“I knew you were a Manes,” Nora began gently, after the pause for their mental discussion. “A grower always knows the seed from which the fruit is born. That was my talent, as I said. There’s a feeling of lineage in all things, what came before, what comes next. I knew your father at Caulfield, your brother, other family members, but I also knew that Tripp was different. A candle burns from a wick, the braided fibers are protected by wax. That was Tripp to me, the wick burning, and I was the wax. And that day he tried to free me, I will never forget the feeling of that light inside my heart going out after he was killed. You are that light for my son, I could see it on your aura.” 

The poetry of her words didn’t make a dent on Alex’s expression. He turned toward Michael instead, lifting an eyebrow toward him. “Well? Does that match how you feel?”

“Yeah,” Michael answered, his throat tight with worry. “Like she said though, you’re the wick in a candle, but kinda remember this, you can burn a wick without wax. It will go up and burn freely, but me? I only feel whole and useful when you’re here. It’s fine… I’m used to it okay? If you want to go back to your life in Nashville, I’ll survive. I’m pretty sure you can go and love someone else.”

“But you can’t.”

“Not as far as I know, but maybe I don’t want to either, okay?” Michael took a deep breath, pulling away from Nora to stand up and approach Alex. His hands itched to take Alex into his arms, his cells practically hummed in the anticipatory pleasure that he always received from touching Alex, and now with his mother’s explanations swimming in his thoughts, he finally understood it better. “I get it though, all you’ve brought me over the years is love, that something good to think about. The order to my chaos, that’s what you give to me. Even when we were apart, I was happy knowing that you were thriving out there. But now, all I’ve done is weigh you down with my bullshit ever since you came back to town. Especially now that we know your dad was more than a class-1 prick, but running an alien Auschwitz. Just…” There was no room to feel embarrassed, carrying out this conversation in front of his mother, because it was too important to Michael to have Alex understand the truth. “It really does kill me to know that I’ve brought on more pain to your life, even as just a bystander.”

Alex dropped his gaze from Michael downward to his feet, flexing his toes in the long pile fibers of carpet in the bedroom. “I wouldn’t have done anything differently, I don’t think, not after what my dad did to you and to your people. We can talk about the rest later.” His gaze flickered back to where Nora was watching them with a calm expression, then he lifted his chin to Michael, “Call Valenti. See if you can get him to meet us at the hospital.”

*** 

Later the car ride back to the rental house from the hospital was hushed between them. Kyle had used his hospital privileges to secure Alex an emergency CT scan of his foot and confirmed what Nora had sensed with her fingertips. It had already begun, just barely visible on the scans and maybe a more conservative treatment would have been radiation; except Alex was already armed with the knowledge of his father’s own cancer that had remained immune. After confirmation, it was just a matter of making a tentative schedule for pre-op tests before the needed amputation, as Kyle and Alex compared calendars together. 

All Michael could do during that consultation was stand uselessly to the side, wrapped in helplessness and guilt, while Kyle handed Alex pamphlets regarding the procedure and pre-op instructions regarding outfitting a house for accessibility. 

“You blame yourself,” Alex said, stating it confidently as he parked his Mercedes in the driveway next to Jenna Cameron’s sheriff’s department cruiser. “You shouldn’t. It’s not your fault, okay?” 

“I’m trying. Just feels like if I had been there, I could have protected you,” Michael sighed, rubbing his left hand absently. His actions drew Alex’s sharp gaze downward, the physical reminder of the last time Michael had stepped in between Alex and certain danger. The bruises on Alex’s throat took weeks to heal, and Michael knew that without a doubt, he had saved Alex’s life that night.

“Do you blame me for that? What my dad did? I did bring you back to the shed-”

“Of course not, you didn’t know your dad took a half day on base. And for an NCO, Jesse Manes was pretty immune to following anyone’s orders but his own.” Michael sighed, having had this discussion before in the past. Seven years on, and Alex still stuttered over absolving himself for his dad’s actions. 

“You mentioned Max had a healing ability, but you never had him heal it for you?”

Michael smiled weakly, “I’m pretty sure during those years we lived together, you would have noticed if I had come home with a completely healed hand.”

“Yeah but after I left-” Alex began tentatively.

“First I hoped that you were coming back, then I hoped that I would be able to join you in Nashville.” Back when he had anchored in Roswell believing that he needed to support Isobel, looking at that charming lawyer wooing his sister, Noah Bracken, as the answer to his prayers. A brief wave of bitterness took over, now that he knew the truth behind that man. The lies of his identity. Fuck, he still wasn’t sure what sort of life-stealing Noah did that his mom mentioned, murders even, but it was clear his sister had been manipulated mentally by him for years. Michael flexed his hand slowly, “Now, this is a part of me. Because I wouldn’t have done anything different that day with your dad, he would have killed you.”

“Well going to Caulfield, that was my choice too, Michael. And Jim showed me the defenses, there were heat registers in the main hallways designed to alert security if someone with your body temperature stepped inside them. You would have been caught and held captive before you went ten feet inside. Now that might have killed me.” 

It was logical. Rational. It should have settled the subject in his mind. Michael had his mother’s memories of the place in his head now, the ways she had watched for a chance to escape, what the guards had done to them to ensure that no one did. She had wanted him to know that she had tried to break free for years, especially once she had realized he had left the safety of the pod. _I did not lay down and give up, my love. I fought to live, so I could see you again, I held onto my sanity with both hands, so I might know you in a free world._

There was still that bubble of doubt in Michael’s throat. 

“If you hadn’t come back here from Nashville, you wouldn’t be looking at this shitty outcome.” 

“Maybe. I mean, sure I got blackmailed into coming back while my father was dying instead of waiting until he was in his grave, but I always planned on coming back.” Alex covered his hand, stroking gentle fingertips over the scars on his fist, “I came here to see you, to see if we could give it another shot or if not, so I could get some closure on how we ended. Then it was, it was like what you said before, nothing’s changed at all. It’s like that for me too.”

“You’re not mad, about the — about how my kind is wired?” Michael asked tentatively.

“Seems like we’re both wired that way, Michael, but no, I’m not mad. I mean, it’s a little bit of a relief to know it’s not my money that interests you,” Alex joked, the humor lightening the mood between them in the car. The clock was nearing toward three a.m. and above them was a sky of endless black with scattered stars. “Now I guess I will have to figure out how I’m going to make a living as a guitar player, like maybe I should make the switch to piano, since it’s easier to sit on stage and perform.”

Michael leaned across the front seat to catch Alex’s mouth in a slow, thorough kiss. He broke the kiss after a moment as the words spilled out of him, “You always amaze me, you’re so damn strong, and God, I have missed you so much. I missed how you make me feel so safe and assured that things are going to be okay.” 

Before Alex could respond, Michael dipped down to kiss him again. This time he felt Alex pause for just a moment, as if to consider whether he wanted to argue with Michael, before he kissed Michael back. Fiercely and without question. It was everything that Michael remembered and more, from over those hungry years. Alex tasted like honey lemon, those lozenges he kept on hand for his singing voice, but under that flavor was something unmistakably _Alex_. 

The candle burned, the wick and the wax as Nora described it, bringing light to the darkness they faced ahead. Together.

*** 

“You keep showing up like this, I’m gonna start thinkin’ you like me or something,” Michael called to Kyle, as he looked up from his laptop in his office at Truman & Sanders Automotive Repairs and Salvage. 

Three years later, his life had changed in both big and small ways. He was still a mechanic, still covered in grease most days, but after finding out just who Walt Sanders was to him, and more importantly to his mother Nora, he was now responsible for the day-to-day operations. Walt had his hands full most days following Nora around the ranch that Alex had purchased when the need for more space and privacy made the rental house obsolete. The foreclosed farm had quickly become the emerald jewel of the valley under Nora’s hands, with gardens that now churned out 90 percent of the produce for the local food banks. Walt had willingly left behind the machinery to reclaim his old livelihood as a “farm brat”.

“You know exactly how much I like you, Michael,” Kyle quipped, before dropping into the chair on the other side of the desk. His face, still handsome enough to give Michael’s pulse a quick rabbit-jump of arousal, was creased in annoyance currently. He held out his fingers to size out an inch in illustration, “And that is the amount of affection I feel comfortable confessing out loud without your husband in earshot.” 

“We’re not married,” Michael rolled his eyes in response before returning his attention to the inventory updates on his laptop. Not yet. Both were aware they each had rings for one another, but still there was enough uncertainty in their lives that the promise stayed unspoken. The major sticking point between them was that after three years, with zero contact with Flint who was an Army-black ops ghost now, no one knew where the remaining survivors from Caulfield had been moved. Michael had argued that they could get married without knowing the truth, while Alex had argued he knew that the moment they exchanged vows, the anti-alien weapon under development would appear to kill everyone. Rational or not, Michael was too alien to utterly dismiss superstition as groundless.

“Seriously, what brings you here now?”

“I need you to talk to him about continuing his rehab.”

He closed his laptop to face Kyle with his full attention. “You think I haven’t tried?”

The original surgery had involved the removal of Alex’s right foot. Three years later, Alex had needed two more surgeries, each time taking a little more of his right leg until the amputation stopped just short of his knee. It was finally at a place where the latest scans had shown no signs of the alien-induced cancer creeping upward, mainly because Kyle had finally finished his surgical residency and could take over Alex’s case on his own. The earlier doctors handling Alex’s case had been skeptical of aggressive treatment, playing it too conservatively when it came to their plan of care. 

Kyle had had the value of Nora’s advice in consulting where to cut and how much to resect. As confident as he was in success, Kyle still took a gung-ho attitude in making sure that Alex followed all of the required rehabilitation and physical therapy. Maybe once upon a time, if he had gone through with his father’s plans for military service, Alex might have been more tractable when it came to following medical advice. Today, as a creative force used to making his own schedule and arrangements in music, it was fair to say that Alex Manes was the worst patient in the world.

“Well try again, I did some really good work on his leg, and I don’t want him messing it up by neglecting his therapy,” Kyle muttered. Suddenly the sounds of Taylor Swift’s “Mine” filled the small office, _“you made a rebel of a careless man's careful daughter, you are the best thing, that's ever been mine”_. Michael’s eyebrows reached his hair as Kyle blushed and fumbled with his phone. “Liz! Hi!”

Well. Michael knew that he and Kyle shared exactly one acquaintance in common named Liz. He looked at his calendar, realizing that it was June, and very soon they would be marking the ten-year anniversary of Rosa’s death. After that confrontation with Nora at Alex’s old rental house, no one had seen Noah Bracken since. The few answers that Nora had had for Isobel had revolved around easing blocked memories and untangling the hold that Noah had established on Isobel’s mind, for over ten years.

That revelation had caused another town-wide brown out. Max in the years since had become obsessed with righting as many wrongs as he could. From finding Noah to punish him for what he had done to Isobel to tracking any hint on the dark web regarding the Caulfield survivors, Max had split his time with Cam on long distance trips crisscrossing the United States looking for more of their people. When he wasn’t on the road with Cam, he was with Nora practicing his healing abilities and energy transfer. Despite Michael’s protests, he knew that Max wanted to resurrect Rosa. Jim Valenti had fully embraced the madness as well, covering for Max at work and throwing all sorts of money to finance their quests. 

Jenna Cameron was the only tether Max had on his impulsiveness and Michael thanked his stars every day that she was in on their secret. He wasn’t sure if they were still engaging in the fiction of friends with benefits, but he knew that Cam had become the right hand to Max’s daily life in every way from work to his powers to their research together. 

In the meantime, Isobel had taken Noah’s betrayal almost in stride (she had demolished all of his possessions and had a bonfire that had brought Jim Valenti and half the firebrigade to her subdivision). When the dust had cleared, she had become a frequent guest with Nora at the rental house, sitting at her feet to hear stories about Louise, then later about Roy. With Alex’s help, they had found the reservation that offered sanctuary, met Harrison and learned about Patricia, the surviving child. Michael learned that the make-shift family he and Alex had of Maria and Mimi in Roswell, were actually family, alien-family. 

“Yeah, I know, it’s ten years this month,” Kyle answered, with mixed emotions in his voice. He had found a certain amount of peace with his dad over the years, helped by Jim’s full commitment to protect Nora and the other two survivors from the government. The sheriff had permanently deeded the hunting cabin to the surviving couple Wanyat and Verora, and that had gone a long way in repentance for his sins. Even after that, there was still a space of awkwardness between Kyle and his dad that Michael thought might be permanent.

Michael waited as Kyle made agreeable sounds until he finally hung up the call. A long minute stretched between them as Kyle seemed lost in mentally combing through that phone call. “So, what’s my ringtone, if Liz has ‘Mine’.”

“You really want to know?” Kyle asked, rubbing the stubble on his jaw. “From the incomparable album ‘Red’. You’re ‘I knew you were trouble’ on my phone.”

Well. He couldn’t argue with that, at least it wasn’t something more emotionally devastating like ‘All Too Well’ or ‘Begin Again’. One of his deepest secrets from Alex was how much of Taylor Swift’s discography was part of Michael’s brain after exposure to Kyle’s tastes because Alex, despite his part-time commuting to Nashville had definite opinions regarding the singer. That tiny hint of humor was something he tucked down inside, something to hold close for later. Michael licked his lips nervously, “So that was Liz.”

“Yeah. So on the scale of 1 to 10, how much of a disaster are we looking at if I tell you she was calling me from ten miles outside the city limits of Roswell?” 

“Category 5 hurricane.”

“Yeah, that’s what I thought.” Kyle got to his feet, brushing his hands down his khaki pants to remove any dust from the old auto garage office. “So I’m going to go ahead and say ‘not it’ when it comes to breaking this news to everyone.”

“Oh come on, I have to tell Alex, the least you can do is tell Max for me,” Michael protested. Letting his brother know that Liz Ortecho was coming back to town might trigger another failure of the power grid, to say nothing of what Cam’s reaction would be hearing that. 

“Sorry, he’s your brother, he’s your problem and that’s the breaks for you. Guess you really do live a really hard life.”

Michael couldn’t argue with that observation. He did in a lot of ways live a hard life, always on the edge of paranoia about the government, but he still could comfort himself with the knowledge that he had people now that he could depend upon. Once, he could only number his family on one hand, with Max and Isobel, then he met Alex. Rebellious, sweet, kind Alex who had changed Michael’s life permanently when they fell in love. Through Alex, he had gathered Mimi and Maria over those hungry years, but now they were even closer now with the tie of alien-heritage. Somewhere along the line he had gathered even more friends, like Kyle, Jenna, even Jim Valenti, all of which had led him to his mother, Nora. 

However, that first catalyst was Alex, and while the chips had fallen in painful patterns at times over the last ten years, in the end, he had ended up with a home. Finding a home that wasn’t in the stars, but in small, tourist-gaudy, Roswell with its stubborn racists and too-busy military base was the greatest surprise to Michael. 

The hard breaks of life with Alex adjusting to the loss of his leg, the hard truths that still lingered under the surface in Max’s manic quests for answers, the hard lies that Michael knew Cam held onto about Max, there was no shortage of challenges on the horizon for him, but Michael could face them. The demons of the past slept deeper now inside Michael with a family surrounding him. 

Speaking of, Michael raised his voice to catch Kyle as he pulled open the door, “Come over tomorrow night, Mom wanted to have a big family dinner anyway. Alex is back from recording, I think Max and Cam are finished with their trip to Arizona, so it’s a good time for all of us to gather. Multiple birds, one stone.”

“I’ll bring the candles, just in case,” Kyle joked lightly, referencing Max. “I’m sure Liz coming back to town will go just fine. No need to worry at all with our half-sister in a pod and your brother brooding over how to resurrect her.”

“Max promised absolutely no resurrections until he understands the power transfer fully. So as long as no one gets shot, I’m sure it’ll be fine.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading. Comments are very much treasured. Please do not seek out my inbox on Tumblr if this story wasn't to your taste.
> 
> Today's post brought my ao3 stats to over 300,000 words for 2020. I made a donation to the Navajo Santa organization in tribute to that milestone. https://navajosanta.org/


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